I LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. I 



«£& 



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I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



it Stones 



IN OUE LIFE-JOURNEY. 



/ 



BY 



SAMUEL OSGOOD, D.D., LL. D., 

AUTHOR OP "THE HEABTH-STONE," ETC. 



New and Enlarged Edition. 



+1 



Why should we fear, youth's draught of joy, 

If pure would sparkle less ! 
Why should the cup the sooner cloy, 

Which God hath deigned to bless* 

Who but a Christian, through all life 

That blessing may prolong t 
Who through the world's sad day of strife 

Still chant his morning song? 

Emu. 



NEW YORK: 
E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY, 

713 Broadway. 
1877. 

nr 







Copyright, 

Samuel Osgood 

1876. 




The Library 

&fc CCJNHKESS 



TO 

THE CLASS OF 1832, 

(harvard university,) 

in remembrance of pleasant tears together, 

and with ever deepening affection, 

$t)is Solum* is 3UHttatt&, 

BY 

THEIR CLASSMATE. 



PKEFACE 



The papers that make up the substance of this 
volume, aim to treat the chief stages in human life, 
in connection with their attendant lessons and ex- 
periences. Thus the volume seeks to do for our 
pilgrimage what " The Hearth- St one" sought to 
do for the household. It is written in a similar 
vein, with an equally practical and religious pur- 
pose, and the author will think himself very happy 
if he is allowed to attend as a companion by the 
way, the many kind readers who have admitted his 
former book to their homes. 

The introductory chapter was an after thought 
of the writer, during the leisure of his summer va- 
cation, and may be omitted by all readers who do 
not care for such personal reminiscences. Perhaps, 
however, to not a few, these introductory sketches 
may give the key note to the whole, and win to the 



O PREFACE. 

survey of life in general an attention quickened as 
well as sobered by each reader's personal remem- 
brances. 

If this volume makes one young man more 
thoughtful, or one old man more cheerful, nay if it 
leads one pilgrim to go on his way more bravely 
and faithfully, with sober memory as the guide of 
his sanguine hope, the author will be repaid for a 
service that has cost him not a little care, however 
simple his work may seem. If his style seems 
sometimes too plain and hortatory, let readers al- 
low him to be content with directness and useful- 
ness, if at the expense of more stately elaboration. 
He is encouraged to believe that these essays will 
meet with some sympathy, because each of them 
embodies an actual experience, either personal or 
professional 

To the above Preface to the first edition of this book, 
the author needs only to add the remark, that after going 
through several editions, it has been for some years out 
of print, and that the friends who wish to see it again 
will find some fresh notes of the author's experience and 
thought in later years in the closing chapter now added. 
New York, November 1, 1876. 



CONTENTS 



PAGB 

Companions by the Way. An Introductory Sketch, . 9 

1. School Days, . . . . . . .13 

2. College Life, 29 

3. A Village Church, 40 

4. City Experiences, . . . . . 53 
God's Blessing on the Journey, . .... 67 

Childhood, 81 

The Song that Never Tires, ...... 9? 

Youth, 10& 

The True Fire, 121 

Manhood and its Business, 135 

Losses and Anxieties, 149 

The True Rest, ... .... 163 

Middle-Age, . . Iff 

Cloud and Fire, 191 

Old Age, 207 



8 CONTENTS. 

PA01 

Peospect and Ketrospect, 221 

Death, . . . .. . • . • • . . 235 

Immortality as Fact, 249 

Immortality as Motive, . . . . • • . 263 

Home Evermore, 277 

The Great Cycle, ........ 293 

After Thoughts. Closing Eemembrances, . . 309 

1. Under the Trees, 313 

2. On the Pavement, 323 

3. Our Flag, 330 

4. Abroad, 336 

5. Studies, . . . . . . . . . 341 

6. The Outlook, 358 



fctptras bg t\t Wag, 



AN INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 



1 Come then, my friends, or sad or smiling,— -whether 
On you life's load weighs heavier day hy day, 
Or blessings over new like summer weather, 

With flowers adorn, with fruite enrich your way, 
We go to meet the coming day together. 

Then live we, walk we happy while we may. 
Bo, wnen our children mourn that we are past, 
To cheer their souls, our faithful loves shall last." 

Goethe. 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 

3ln Sntrntetnras iktfrij. 

A year ago during the summer vacation, I prepared for 
the press a volume of essays upon home-life under the 
name of " The Hearth- Stone." The kind reception of this 
book has led me to think of another of somewhat kindred 
purpose. These " Mile-Stones " are intended to mark the 
leading points and passes of our pilgrimage, as " The 
Hearth-Stone " aimed to note the chief experiences of our 
abiding place. The pleasant summer time has come once 
more, and with it a short season of leisure that is made all 
the more cheerful by some occupation that is not hardship. 
Before approaching the graver topics to be treated, may 
not author and reader have a little chat together upon old 
scenes and friends by way of Preface, with the hope of 
making the circle more close and social ? This is pecu- 
liarly the season of reunions, and few persons are so en- 
grossed in business as not to find a few days' leisure for re- 
visiting the old homestead, or running away to some coun- 
try resting-place. Bight heartily the summer resting time 



12 MILE STONES IN OUR LlEE- JOURNEY. 

chimes in with the winter's merry-making and the genial 
crackling flame of the Christmas log seems to be dis- 
coursing of these happy hours in the country under the 
greenwood tree. This book that may not make its appear- 
ance until the winter holidays, will not be any less fitting 
because it brings a summer garland upon its front. 

Every man is largely a debtor to his companions, and 
in revising these unambitious essays that undertake to 
give some practical views of prominent passages in human 
life, I see in every page some traces of the kindness and 
wisdom that have never in one form or another ceased 
their sympathy and their counsel. Take from a man all 
the knowledge and strength that he has received from asso- 
ciates, and you strip him of himself, and take his inmost 
life away. Before using our own eyes, we first see through 
the eyes of others ; and however mature our vision, there 
will always be some subjects that we study better by 
hearty sympathy with others than by any proud philoso- 
phy of our own. It would be a somewhat interesting study 
for any man to trace his character, his habits and opinions 
to their source in his personal associations, and ascribe 
each dominant tendency to its cause. The grave-digger 
in Hamlet makes the groundlings in the pit shake their 
sides with laughter as he strips off garment after garment, 
and at last his rotund figure, robbed of its lendings, stands 
out in its own sorry dimensions. Far sorrier would be the 
plight of any man who could limit his experience to his own 
intuitions and throw off all dependence upon the fellowship 
of friends and the gathered wisdom of his race. A young 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 13 

man does not of himself know the whole of youth, nor does 
any old man exhaust the whole meaning of age. Young 
and old can be wise only by breathing the atmosphere of 
good society and good books, and rounding their own nar- 
rowness by such high communion. Surely were it not for 
such helps, even a task like the present, which seeks to 
treat but cursorily of very various stages and experiences 
of life, would have been dismissed as presumptuous. It is 
not presumptuous in this connection to give some desultory 
reminiscences of companions that may be recognised by a 
friendly knot of readers, and may, perhaps, start kindred 
retrospection in others. Our reader will be in the better 
mood to think of the lessons of the great pilgrimage if our 
chat together may jog the elbow of his own memory, and 
move him to illustrate the way-marks of the journey by 
scraps from his own unwritten journal. 

I. — SCHOOL DAYS. 

It is not well for a man ever to forget his childhood, 
and it is a sad and sterile experience that parts company 
with young hopes. To many of us the old play-ground 
that we have set aside as the haunt of folly, may teach a 
lesson deeper far than what our worldliness is proud to 
call wisdom. In a late trip to Massachusetts, I re-visited 
familiar scenes of boyhood and youth, and our school and 
college days rose as freshly to mind as if they were of yes- 
terday, and the absentee had been a middle-aged man only 
in dreams. I stood upon the old battle hill whose north- 



14 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

ern Siope, reaching to the river, was our play-ground thirty 
years ago, and it was not difficult to people the place with 
shapes far different from those that meet the eye. Then 
from the hill-top with its modest little monument to War- 
ren and his fellow martyrs, down to the shore of the Mys- 
tic, the land was a great pasture, unbroken, except by one 
or two little cottages. Now it is covered with houses, and 
the pebbly beach of the river which was our perpetual de- 
light, has been possessed and hidden by wharves and fac- 
tories that are usually called improvements. That stately 
school, fitly the pride of the whole neighborhood, stands 
upon the bed of an old pond, and scores of urchin republi- 
cans now learn to read and spell where frogs croaked to the 
evening stars, and turtles basked in the noonday sun. The 
tall obelisk that now crowns the hill is itself far less a wonder 
than the great landscape which it displays from its sum- 
mit. Within thirty years the whole vicinity has changed ; 
and whether we eye the dome of the observatory at Cam- 
bridge, the ssore of railways that stretch their iron web 
in every direction from the Pilgrim city, or the steamers 
that ply through the harbor, the proofs are clear that the 
new powers have invaded those old haunts, and the nine- 
teenth century has encamped a host more powerful than 
the British invaders about that old battle ground. 

A river is a famous playmate, and is quite ready to 
join in almost any game. The Mystic, notwithstanding 
its utilitarian metamorphosis, seems now in the gleam of 
sunset to give a look of familiar recognition, as if beneath 
all his new cares and burdens, remembering his old play- 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 15 

fellow, with whom, years ago, he used to swim and row, 
and fish and skate, and lounge and dream. He was a ver- 
satile companion, whose resources never were exhausted. 
His moods were as many as a poet's, and changed with 
every sky, and wind, and tide. Nothing could be more 
cheering than our Mystic, when the full tide, flooding his 
green banks, gave his bright face the look of inspiration ; 
and when the tide was out, and the dark flats were laid 
bare, his face seemed emptied of its glory, like poor Cow- 
per's, when deserted by the genial muse, and left to the 
mud and ooze of Acheron. Yet even this gloomy aspect 
of the river was not without advantage. His bare shores 
were a mine of wealth to many a fisherman on the look- 
out for shell-fish, for' bait, or for his table. Then, more- 
over, the tide never left the channels wholly bare, and two 
threads of deep water never failed to mark the deep bed 
of the river with their silver, so that this son of Neptune 
slept like a sea-king. Adventurous boys, the writer among 
the number, would sometimes swim across the channel to 
explore the great central bed, not without ample reward 
in the brave store of fish of various kinds, and sometimes 
of rare size, that were stranded upon the bank, or impris- 
oned in the little basins. In full tide our river bore no- 
ble freight upon its bosom, and harbored creatures of no 
mean pretensions in its waters. The hulls of huge ves- 
sels from the shipyards of Medford came floating by us on 
the way to their ocean home, and we surely thought that 
the great leviathan had come, whenever a stray seal lifted 
his cynical nose above the surface. There were some per- 



16 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

sonages that seemed to have a peculiar relation to the 
river, and to be as much a part of it as the fish or the 
banks. There was an old man, an ancient mariner in- 
deed, who seemed to have a secret understanding with the 
stream, to know every turn and eddy of the tide, the haunt 
and likings of every fish, and the place and use of all 
kinds of bait. I can see the old fisherman as plainly as 
the day now, although years ago he was hooked by the great 
fisher of men ; and I can never see a perch or a flounder in 

the market, without thinking of S , the fisherman of 

the Mystic. To children there is something weird and im- 
posing in all kinds of special knowledge or power, and S. 
shared this prestige with another odd character, who 
made his appearance about twice a week in a skiff from 
the opposite bank of the river, usually well laden in sum- 
mer with apples or some kind of farm produce. He was 
a cross man, and report said that the little keg in the bot- 
tom of his boat was not intended for water only, yet we 
were always glad to see him starting out from the creek on 
Chelsea shore, and pulling with his adroit oars for our 
beach. We never could make him out satisfactorily, be- 
ing especially puzzled by his uncertain distribution of ap- 
ples, and boys are like men in taking " omne ignotum pro 
mirifico" so that this familiar oarsman stands even to 
this day among the mythical personages of our annals. 
On the bridge which crossed the river, we used to watch 
the great throng of Eastern travel, and felt that we were 
quite in the world, as we counted their number and va* 
riety. The bridge is comparatively quiet now, and the 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 17 

incessant lines of stage-coaches have yielded to other con- 
veyances, that make small account of the horse's speed. 
We cannot meet now in an evening walk the characters 
whose step we used to mark in our rambles over that tho- 
roughfare. We held our breath, with admiration, many a 
time, as we looked upon a man of foreign mien and dress, 
who used to distance all competition with his angling rod, 
and drew huge bass from the river, as if they were min- 
nows. He was said to be the Russian consul of Boston, 
and I must confess to a certain involuntary respect for the 
empire of the Czar, that dates from that early knowledge 
of the prowess of one of his subjects. There was a memo- 
rable traveller over the bridge, whom we used to eye with 
equal interest but less admiration. He was a tall man, 
with long hair, and a stooping, awkward gait, yet a very 
fast walker, who seemed to ignore the use of the horse, 
and put himself upon his own independent footing. He 
was thought to be immensely rich, and to be the solitary 
lord of a whole island near the Chelsea shore. His walks 
are now over, the drawbridge to his lonely domain is dis- 
mantled, and through a deep cut in the high back of his 
island, the locomotive thunders along with its huge bur- 
dens, and whistles democratic defiance at the dust of the 
old proprietor, and at every remnant of feudal despotism. 
Beyond our river the Chelsea shore rose by a graceful 
slope to a considerable hill, over whose shoulders towered 
the summit of another and distant hill that seemed to our 
boyish eyes the very limit of the horizon. When leave 
was granted one holiday week to pass a day with a play- 



18 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

fellow whose father's farm was at the foot of that height, 
the little journey rose into the grandeur of travel, and 
Ledyard himself never felt more proud of his marches. 
To crown the whole, when our adventurous little company 
scaled the summit, looked out upon the vast ocean, then 
descended the opposite side, bathed in the sea surf, and 
came back laden with a goodly store of luscious berries 
and strange shells, never was Alexander more proud of his 
conquests ; although, as we saw the big sails in the offing, 
sweeping towards foreign lands, we knew that we had not 
yet quite compassed the globe, and could not share his 
chagrin that there are no more worlds to conquer. The 
river and that distant hill had appeared to bound our uni- 
verse, and childish as the illusion seemed, it is one that 
every age of life in some way repeats, and as long as we 
live we are crossing some last stream, or climbing some 
final obstacle, only to find broader waters and higher ob- 
stacles rolling and swelling before our path. Sad blow to 
our childish romance ! our Ultima Thule has fallen into 
the hands of speculators, and the stately hill, with its 
graded house-lots, figures among the fancy-stocks of the 
land market. 

The better philosophy that is now gaining ground is 
rescuing childhood from contempt, and finding traits of 
Providential wisdom in the play-spirit that makes so much 
of the poetry of our early years. Purely we can never 
work well when we forget to play ; and I verily believe 
that some of the worst traits and coarsest vices of our na- 
tion come from over much worldly care and utter neglect 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 19 

of healthful sports that stir without inebriating the blood 
and nerves. In childhood, the force of nature educates us 
in spite of ourselves, and every genial playground is a 
monitorial school to teach the muscles, senses, and facul- 
ties, their offices. Our circle of playfellows has disap- 
peared, and many of them have gone to their graves ; yet 
mature years have but deepened our conviction of their 
power, and our charity for their defects. Looking back 
now with a keener eye for character, it is not difficult to 
remember traits of enterprise and daring that needed the 
arena only to make their possessors famous. Almost every 
boy was distinguished for something. The biggest dunce 
at books was the chief hero among horses, and with his 
critical eye and firm rein made the rest of us fall abashed 
into the background as he rode proudly by. Not a few 
sprightly natures that were very wizards in inventing 
sports for our Wednesday and Saturday afternoons, could 
not summon a single spell to their aid when called up for 
recitation. The great wonder is, that boys are preserved 
safe in limb and life in spite of their reckless pranks. What 
one of us now would, as of old, venture at any moment's 
offer to extemporize a fast gallop upon any chance steed 
without waiting for the saddle ; and who of us, who have 
kept up our acquaintance with salt water, can look with- 
out a shudder now to those high wharves and buildings 
from which we used to jump and dive in the merriest 
sport ? Surely there is a guardian angel over the bones as 
over the heart of childhood ; and call the benign power 
" Nature," or some more winning name, we must all own 



20 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

its ministry, and be thankful for its blessing. There is 
something in the Catholic " Hymn to My Guardian An- 
gel " that comes home to every school-boy's experience, 
and which he need not be ashamed to repeat in mature 
years : — 

" Thy beautiful and shining face 
I see not, though so near ; 
The sweetness of thy soft, low voice 
I am too deaf to hear. 

" I cannot feel thee touch my hand 
With pressure light and mild, 
To check me as my mother did 
When I was but a child. 

" But I have felt thee in my thoughts 
Fighting with sin for me ; 
And when my heart loves God, I know 
The sweetness is from thee. 

"Ah me! how lovely they must be 
Whom God has glorified ; 
Yet one of them, sweetest thought ! 
Is ever at my side." 

No man, indeed, who has a keen memory, will take a 
wholly roseate view of boyhood and its associations, for 
too many of its passions and strifes have stamped them- 
selves upon the very threshold of his career. Yet time 
never fails to bring out a meaning, deeper than we of old 
knew, and it is surely no small part of manly wisdom to 
buy experience with the small coin of childish humors and 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 2 J 

follies, instead of postponing the purchase until fortune 
and character may be given in exchange. 

From the old battle hill, I can see the site of the 
school house where two or three hundred boys were 
gathered together to be whipped and taught as their fa- 
thers were before them. A new edifice, indeed, has taken 
the place of our school, yet upon its statelier front I can 
see, as if drawn in the air by a strange pencil, the outline 
of that ancient building with its round belfry, whose iron 
tongue held such imperial command of our hours. It 
costs no great effort to summon back one of those famous 
Examination Days that absorbed the anticipation of months 
and made the week almost breathless with anxiety. There 
shines the nicely sanded floor, which the cunning sweeper 
had marked in waving figures, to redeem it from associa- 
tion with any vulgar dust. There sit the School Commit- 
tee, chief among them the trim chairman, upon whose 
lips, when he pronounces the final opinion of the board, 
the very fates seem to rest their judgment. There too, is 
the throng of parents, kindred and friends, who have come 
to note the performances of the boys, to look pity upon 
their mistakes, and to smile sympathy upon their successes. 
Should the presidential chair fall to his lot, no prouder 
and more radiant day can come to. the school-boy, than 
when, with new clothes and shining shoes, he stands forth 
to speak his well-conned piece, and wears away among 
the admiring crowd, the ribboned medal that marks his 
triumph. 

Our schoolmasters were great characters in our eyes, 



22 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

and the two who held successively the charge of the gram 
mar department, made a prominent figure in our wayside 
chat, and to this day we can find some trace of their in- 
fluence in our very speech and manner. They were men of 
very different stamp and destiny. The first of them was a 
tall fair-faced man, with an almost perpetual smile. I always 
felt kindly towards him, though it was not easy to decide 
whether his smile was the expression of his good-nature, or 
the mask of his severity. He wore it very much the same 
when he flogged an offender, as when he praised a good 
recitation. He seemed to delight in making a joke of 
punishment, and it was a favorite habit of his, to fasten 
upon the end of his rattan the pitch and gum taken from 
the mouths of masticating urchins, and then, coming upon 
their idleness unawares, he would insert the glutinous 
implement in their hair, not to" be withdrawn without an 
adroit jerk and the loss of some scalp locks. Poor fellow ! 
his easy nature probably ruined him, and he left the school, 
not long to follow any industrious calling. When, a few 
years afterwards, I met him in Boston, with the marks of 
broken health and fortune in his face and dress, the sight 
was shocking to all old associations, as if a dignity quite 
sacerdotal had fallen into the dust. His earthly troubles 
have long been ended, and I take some pleasure in record- 
ing a kind and somewhat grateful feeling towards one 
whose name I have not heard spoken these many years. 
His successor was a man of different mould, a stern, reso- 
lute man, his face full of an expression that seemed to say 
that circumstances are but accidents, and it is the will that 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 23 

makes or mars the man. He was not in robust health; 
and it seemed to some of us, who were thoughtful of his 
feelings, that were it not for this he would have been likely 
to pursue a more ambitious career, and give to the bar the 
excellent gifts that he devoted to teaching. He was a most 
faithful teacher, and his frown, like the rain cloud, had a 
richer blessing for many a wayward idler, than his predeces- 
sor's perennial smile. He has borne the burden and the 
heat of the day for many a long year, with ample success, and 
when he falls at his post, it will be with the consciousness 
of having done a good work for his race, in a calling far 
more honored by Heaven than any of the more ambitious 
spheres that perhaps won his youthful enthusiasm. Well 
says the noble Jean Paul Richter : " Honor to those that 
labor in school-rooms ! Although they may fall from notice 
like the spring blossoms, like the spring blossoms they 
fall that the fruit may be born." 

There are two other personages that have much to do 
with every youth's education, and whose names are house- 
hold words in every New England home. The doctor and 
the minister figure largely in every boy's meditations, 
and in our day, the loyalty that we felt towards their pro- 
fessions had not been troubled by a homoeopathic doubt or 
a radical scruple. In our case, it needed no especial do 
cility to appreciate these functionaries. Our doctor was a 
most emphatic character, a man of decided mark in the 
eyes alike of friends and enemies. He was very impatient 
of questions, and very brief yet pithy in his advice, which 
was of marvellous point and sagacity. He lost his brevity, 



24 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-J0URNE1. 

however, the moment that other subjects were broached; 
and he could tell a good story with a dramatic power that 
would have made him famous upon the stage. He was 
renowned as a surgeon, and could guide the knife within a 
hair's breadth of a vital nerve or artery with his left hand 
quite as firmly as with his right. This ambi-dexterity 
extended to other faculties, and he was quite as keen at a 
negotiation as at an amputation. He was no paragon of 
conciliation, and many of the magnates of the profession 
appeared to have little liking for him, and sometimes 
called him a poor scholar, rude in learning and taste, but 
lucky in his mechanical tact. But he beat them out of 
this notion, as of many others, by giving an anniversary 
discourse before the State Medical Association, which won 
plaudits from his severest rivals, for its classical elegance, 
as well as its professional learning and sagacity. It was 
said that the wrong side of him was very wrong and very 
rough. But those of us who knew him as a friend, tender 
and true, never believed that he had any wrong side. 
Certain it is, that they who grew up under his practice, 
have been little inclined to exchange the regular school of 
medicine, with its scientific method and gradual progress, 
for any new nostrums of magical pretensions. 

Our minister had the name of being the wise man of 
the town, and I do not remember to have heard a word in 
disparagement of his mind or motives, even among those 
who questioned the soundness of his creed. His voice has 
always been as no other man's to many of us, whether 
heard as for the first time at a father's funeral, as by me 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 25 

when a child five years old, or in the pulpit from year to 
year. He came to our parish when quite young, and when 
theological controversy was at its full height. A polemic 
style of preaching was then common, and undoubtedly in 
his later years of calm study and more broad and spiritual 
philosophizing, he would have read with some good-natured 
shakes of the head, the more fiery discourses of his novi- 
tiate, Vhilst he might recognize, throughout, the same 
spirit of manly independence, republican humanity, and 
profound reverence that have marked his whole career. 
There was always something peculiarly impressive in his 
preaching. Each sermon had one or more pithy sayings 
that a boy could not forget ; and when the thoughts were 
too profound or abstract for our comprehensioD, there was 
an earnestness and reality in the manner which held the 
attention, like a brave ship under full sail that fixes the 
gaze of the spectator, though he may not know whither she 
is bound or what is her cargo, sure enough that she is 
loaded with something, and is going right smartly some- 
where. It was evident that our minister was a faithful 
student and indefatigable thinker When the best books 
afterwards came in our way, we found that the guiding 
lines of moral and spiritual wisdom had already been set 
before us, and we had been made familiar with the well 
winnowed wheat from the great fields of humanity. Every 
thought, whether original or from books, bore the stamp 
of the preacher's own individuality ; and many will indorse 
the saying, that upon topics of philosophic analysis and of 
practical morals, he was without a superior, if not without 
2 



26 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

a rival, in our pulpits. It is a great thing for young 
people to grow up under happy religious auspices, and re- 
ligion itself has a new charm and power when dispensed 
by a man who is always named in the family with rever- 
ence and tenderness. The world would be far better, and 
Christian service would be much more truly valued, if 
there were more just and emphatic tribute paid to efficient 
pastoral labor. Our well known minister has now a more 
conspicuous station ; but he cannot easily have deeper in- 
fluence than when pastor for a score of years over a united 
parish, and one of the leaders of public opinion upon all 
topics of high importance. It is well that the new post h 
in such harmony with the previous career ; for the head 
of a college, according to our old-fashioned ideas, should 
be a minister, and he should always abide in due manner 
by the pastoral office. 

Our town, although but a suburb of the great city, was 
not unvisited by the noted personages of the land, and 
Presidents, Governors, Senators, &c, astounded our boy- 
hood with their presence. I remember creeping into a 
very small place to catch a glimpse of Webster as he stood 
up to give his oration at the laying of the corner-stone on 
Bunker Hill, and the tones of his majestic voice chimed 
well with the massive strength of his brow. Never were 
our people more moved than when our own representative 
Everett, gave us the first specimen of his charming oratory 
not long after he bore his classic laurels from the Pro- 
fessor's chair of ease into the dusty arena of political life. 
He appeared first in the procession, and astonished us by 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 27 

bo youthful looks in a man of such name. He was not fai 
from thirty, and his cheek was full of color, his eye bril- 
liant, his hair curling, and to some of us who had not then 
gone far in the Classical Dictionary, he seemed like a Pe- 
ricles started into life from his marble sleep to charm our 
day. His oration was upon the death of Adams and Jef- 
ferson ; and if school-boys had been umpires, the palm of 
sovereign eloquence would have been given him by accla- 
mation. It may be a small thing to say about so eminent 
a personage, but one who was in youth a neighbor, may 
testify of him that no man, probably, has ever figured in 
our public affairs who has said so few unkind words, and 
done so many kind deeds as he. 

The Navy-yard gave our town some peculiar features, 
and whilst robbing us of our wharf lots, it added some- 
thing to our social privileges. There is much to like in 
Navy officers ; and in point of manners and intelligence, 
the better part of them equal any professional class, in 
spite of their frequent temptations to idleness and frivolity. 
The school in which some of us were prepared for entering 
College, was composed chiefly of the sons and daughters 
of Navy officers, and of course there was no small infusion 
of romance and chivalry in the studies and recreations. 
Our master, fresh from College, was one of those who 
have a charmed manner, and who seems to have won the 
world's favor by the same power that carried the day with 
our wayward wills. His ready sympathy and strong sense 
and fine face disarmed all opposition, and a word or a look 
would subdue the wildest boy or soothe the most fidgety 



28 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY 

girl. Two of us remained under his care after he left the 
school, and recited to him at the Marine Hospital across 
the river, where he pursued his medical studies. It was 
strange place to frequent, and we learned many things be 
sides our Latin, Greek, &c. It was like a great ocean 
beach, upon which the wrecks of every clime were washed. 
There were gathered together in that house of mercy the 
sick and feeble from every race under the sun, from the 
chattering Italian to the phlegmatic Swede, from the 
Malay, whose eye seemed looking for a chance to aim a 
dagger under the ribs, to the amphibious Sandwich 
Islander, who amazed us by playing the fish on the water 
and under the water. Youth leans readily to an ideal 
philosophy and a spiritual faith quite in contrast with the 
startling materialism that is apt to hover over such a haunt 
of bodily suffering, mental eclipse, and frequent dissolu- 
tion. It was well that our minister had schooled us in the 
argument for spiritual realities, and that our early years 
were lighted by a torch proof against the damps and dark- 
ness of such a Golgotha of disease and death. Some 
classes of disease were stern moralists, then, and these 
poor waifs of the sea taught the laws of health and obe- 
dience more eloquently than our worthy College Professor 
whose lectures upon Preserving Health, strange to say, were, 
in our time, given to the Senior Class, when it is too late 
to rob vice and folly of their victims. Those months were 
full of study and progress, small as was the class and busy 
as the teacher was with professional cares. One of the 
two scholars has passed away, and under circumstances 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 29 

that have given him a martyr's name. The other scholar, 
and the master, are now near neighbors in the great city ; 
and not long ago the doctor, who presided at the banquet 
of American Physicians, and the minister at his side, who 
was called to speak in behalf of his own profession on that 
occasion, bandied merry words together over those old 
days of pupilage, when the doctor was master, and the min- 
ister the scholar. I met the physician but a few days ago, 
and we came part of the way into the country together. 
His hair is far from keeping its coal black hue, but his 
eye is about as bright as ever, and the amenities still 
hold their place upon his tongue now so honored as oracle. 

II. COLLEGE LIFE. 

It is not easy for a stranger to understand the feelings 
that have long prevailed among a large portion of the 
people of Massachusetts, towards their chief seminary of 
learning, Harvard University. The oldest college in our 
land is, of course, in some measure, a matter of pride to 
every liberal American ; yet to the Massachusetts men of 
the Old School, Harvard College is one of the articles 
of their creed, and the fundamentals of their allegiance. 
Those of us who were brought up under the auspices of 
Conservatism in politics, and Liberalism in religion, im- 
bibed this sentiment with daily bread and the common air. 
It seemed a prodigious safeguard to have this stronghold 
of learning near us, and the youth who could win entrance 
to its privileges and have the endorsement of its name 



30 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

upon his professional career, was looked upon as one of the 
favored of earth, and the elect of heaven. Things have 
changed somewhat now, and the age of steam and cotton- 
spinning has made sad havoc with academic habits and 
dignities. Wealthy parents do not wait as often, as of 
old, to give their sons a thorough intellectual training be- 
fore sending them into the world, and not a few prominent 
graduates cheapen their Alma Mater by sinking their lit- 
erature and profession in some kind of stock -jobbing. Yet 
to this day, old Harvard has no small company of faithful 
disciples, who look upon her blessing as beyond that of 
pope or council. Imagine our feelings twenty-two years 
ago this August, when entering the charmed seat of letters 
that we had so long looked at from afar with such reve- 
rential eyes. We mustered seventy-two, an unusual num- 
ber for a Freshman class in those days ; and so great was 
the occasion to our juvenile eyes, that it did not seem a 
strange thing that signs and wonders should appear in the 
heavens. The brilliant Aurora that mounted to the very 
zenith the eve of our admission, and from East to West 
formed an arch of flashing light, appeared to us a not un- 
worthy sign of the mysterious world of lore which we were 
entering. More than one of the seventy-two devoutly be- 
lieved that all human knowledge was stored up within 
those walls, and that the student need only go far enough 
to find human knowledge open into divine wisdom within 
that shrine. 

It must be confessed, that college life soon throws cold 
water upon the novice's fond enthusiasm. A boy who has 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 31 

studied mostly by himself, and goes to college with the 
idea that his fellow-students have come there for a thor- 
ough education, and that to be a good scholar is, of course 
the main thing, will find himself for a time strangely mis- 
taken. Appreciating reverently the endowments there 
made to learning by the faith and public spirit of ages, 
and not a little subdued by the kindness, and, perhaps, the 
self-sacrifice of parents and friends in securing him his po- 
sition, he is amazed to find that nothing is so unpopular 
among the stripling throng as faithful study, and nothing 
more in favor than a free and easy contempt of industry 
and its honors. The strangest thing of all is, that the 
best scholars are very likely to fall in with the idlers in 
crying down plodding fidelity, and to use the rich stores 
of learning reserved from their elaborate preparatory train- 
ing, to eclipse their studious rival's recitations, and at the 
same time to throw contempt upon his drudging care. We 
must not judge, however, too harshly this wayward temper 
of youth. Young blood generally has some redeeming ele- 
ment even in its follies, and the objection to devoted study 
comes quite as much from love for a brave, generous spirit, 
as from wilfulness or indolence. The hard-worker, who 
was at first decried as a spiritless dig, soon overcomes the 
prejudice, if he is found to have a brave and hearty pur- 
pose back of his work, whilst the contemptuous idler sinks 
into insignificance as soon as his poverty of motives and 
ideas is discovered. A great change comes over the dispo- 
sitions of students when the first illusion of their novitiate 
passes away. Even the doubtful code of college populari- 



32 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

ty demands that every youth shall have some positive ob- 
ject, and that if indifferent to the fixed routine of study, 
he must find a substitute in some taste, or art, or science 
f his own. This demand shows its working more and 
more as the years pass. With us the clique of idlers be- 
came less and less, until at last it was not easy to find any 
companion, of any sort of consideration, who was not 
making his mark upon the class at large, as well as upon 
his own mind, by some elect pursuit of his own. Not a 
few of our fellows, who stood at great discount in the scale 
of general scholarship, learned, in some one study, some 
branch of natural history, or chemistry, or belles-lettres, 
to surpass some of the very first names upon the rank list. 
In fact, the whole development of intellect and character 
during college life, is as rich a lesson as any taught in the 
manuals ; and no books in the library had contents more 
strange and occult to our understandings, than the seventy- 
two volumes which we brought with us under our caps and 
jackets, or in the hidden man of the mind and heart, to be 
interpreted in the school of life. 

As a theatre for the exhibition of character, our college 
was indeed a University, and our class in itself was no 
poor exponent of the mixed elements of humanity. It is 
a favorite amusement with some to read over the names of 
the old set on the catalogue, and gossip about their various 
characteristics. Destiny, from her mysterious urn, has 
assigned very different lots to our different classmates, and 
a third part of them are no more with us in the world. 
As life appears to us now, and as we have learned more of 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 33 

our own infirmity and of the force of circumstances, we 
take a more kindly view alike of the excellencies and of 
the foibles of our comrades, and we can smile at many traits 
that used to irritate us. A Theophrastus or La Bruyere 
need not have gone beyond our border to find subjects for 
a volume double the size of his own. One man (man is 
the favorite word for student), appeared to be an ingrained 
dandy, to whom the tailor's fashions are the sovereign 
ritual, whilst another, from the very same preparatory 
school, would be an utter sloven, not seldom accused, on 
especial occasions, of robbing the washerwoman of her 
regular spoil, and putting on a soiled shirt for a Sunday or 
holiday. We had devotees who did not scruple to warn 
the indifferent, and to exhort the believing by the most 
enthusiastic religious appeals, not without reliance upon 
supernatural conversion and authority from mystical vi- 
sions ; other classmates we had, who would not call it 
slander to reckon them among the doubting Thomases and 
careless Gallios of the class. We had some men who 
were glib speakers and poor writers, and others, who held 
the easy pen of an Addison, yet were seized with more 
than the dumbness of Zacharias when called to take part 
in extempore debate. We had some prosers that could 
never even take a joke, and some drolls who could not 
help looking a joke when not speaking one. A meta- 
physician might have puzzled himself much, by trying to 
analyze the varieties of wit and humor among our fellows, 
and perhaps some specimens of roguishness might have been 
found that have escaped the pen of Dickens or Thackeray 
2* 



34 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Our most mischievous rogue soon finished his collegiate 
career, and entered a larger field of enterprise. He was a 
genius in his line, and his room was a complete magazine 
of mischief. He kept on hand a variety of fulminating 
powders of his own manufacture, and often a half-dozen 
bomb-shells, filled with water and tightly corked, would be 
hidden in his fire, to astound the unwitting visitor with the 
innocuous yet emphatic explosion of cork and steam. His 
room communicated with the cellar by a trap-door, which 
allowed the occupant free exit and ingress. If his door 
were watched, no sound or sight indicated the inmate's 
participation, and some eager proctor, bent on personal in- 
vestigation of the premises, would be very likely to find the 
perpetrator of the mischief quietly seated in his study- 
chair, conning his book with the puritanical gravity so 
habitual to his long face and straight hair. Every bold 
prank that startled the faculties of the vigilant Parietal 
Board was supposed to originate in him, whether the bell 
was tolled at midnight with no hand visible at the rope, or 
the Commons' knives and forks disappeared, or a hogshead 
of molasses was emptied of its sweets in the Commons' 
kitchen, or the College pump was blown up by a shell. 
Our droll rogue was of wholly another complexion, with a 
face capable of as many funny wrinkles as there are leaves 
in Punch's Almanac, and with powers of legerdemain and 
ventriloquism that might have made his fortune in that 
craft. He went through his course without censure, al- 
though chief source of all the milder practical jokes, and 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAT. 35 

it is not easy to see in the man of science and the grave 
citizen now, our funny comrade of bygone years. 

The contrast between the early indications and the 
final developments of character, is one of the marked points 
of student life. Not seldom the sedate and almost austere 
youth becomes a gay and even a dissipated man, and not 
seldom the frivolous, reckless boy settles down into an 
earnest and even severe manhood. Among our fellew-stu- 
dents in the various classes, how many strange metamor- 
phoses have taken place ! Among us, the prettiest boy of 
our Freshman year came first to mount the judge's bench ; 
the most bashful youth took the lead in matrimony ; and 
more than one gay sauce-box has donned the black coat 
with proper grace, and won high name in the pulpit. In 
the class before us, a famous feud broke out between the 
plainer and the more dashing fellows, the plebs and the 
•patricians of our academic polity, in connection with the 
Hasty Pudding and the Porcellian Clubs. A vehement 
radical led the plebs, and a youth of aristocratic bearing 
and lineage headed the patricians. Strange, yet not unac- 
countable transformation ! the radical now impresses con- 
servative order upon a host of operatives under his rule, 
and the aristocrat is the Coryphaeus of extreme reform, 
advocating the rights of black and white, male and female 
outcasts from the elect circles, with a splendid eloquence 
that might well win plaudits from the hardest-faced Tory- 
ism or Hunkerism. One remark may be fitly made in 
regard to the development of youthful character. It re- 
lates to the worth of mere amateur culture, in comparison 



36 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

with a devoted life-purpose. The most brilliant men 
amount in the end to very little, if they are so little bent 
upon some chosen work, as to think more of shining in 
general, than of shining with a true man's light upon some 
chosen path of service. In our early college years our 
horizon was luminous with the splendor of certain men, 
especially in classes before our own, who were the observed 
of all observers, and the predicted chiefs in literature or 
the professions. The air seemed charmed by their presence, 
and every ear was erect when they spoke. They were 
often engrossed too much with their own shining, to think 
of the prosaic task of being a useful light to others ; and 
with very few exceptions, these men have wholly disap- 
pointed the anticipations of friends regarding their career. 
Life needs an object, as well as a subject, and the more 
humbly and devotedly the object is chosen and pursued, 
the better for the strength of the intellect, as well as for 
the health of the affections. Many a plodding worker, 
with a single eye to his vocation, has won a position and 
evinced powers far beyond the lot of the most brilliant 
rhetoricians, who were in the sunshine of admiration when 
his name was unknown. Transformations of moral char- 
acter no less signal, are to be observed, and if any one fact 
is more important than another, to be pointed out to young 
men, it is the invincible power of a faithful ruling pur- 
pose to mould and transfigure the whole character, giving 
to unpretending worth an energy, and in the end a high 
enthusiasm, that abide by a man when youthful blood has 
calmed its pulses, and youthful sentiment, if left merely 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 37 

to itself, has turned out to be the emptiest of chimeras. 
It was a happy circumstance for the - future of our class, 
that the practical spirit was so dominant, and whilst our 
fellows had their full share of genial fellowship and lite- 
rary taste, we were, most of us, led to look early to some 
chosen object in life. From various causes, whether from 
the example of a few leading companions, or from the ex- 
cellent ministrations of the College Pulpit under the two 
Wares and Palfrey, or from the influence of the churches 
and ministers under whom we were educated at home, 
theology was the favorite profession with us, and no class 
on the catalogue of late, has equalled ours in the number 
of names italicised as ministers. Nothing in professional 
life has been happier with us, than this association of its 
cares with the hopes and affections of our youthful days. 
Our classmates in other professions undoubtedly share the 
same satisfaction, and the charm of our meetings is in the 
harmony of variety, which different tastes and pursuits 
bring to the genial circle. 

I have been this summer upon a flying visit to Cam- 
bridge, and it seems almost a sacred duty, as well as a 
high pleasure, to make at least a yearly pilgrimage to the 
old shrine of faith and learning. It is pleasant to have 
uch assurance that in this changing world, some of the 
ancient landmarks remain, and to refresh our careworn 
minds by the sight of scenes and friends so cherished. 
Time has dealt very gently with our good mother, and her 
years are marked by progress without decay. The new 
arts and sciences have come to lay their trophies at her 



38 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

feet, in the treasures and appliances of the Scientific School 
and the Observatory, and the old Puritan worthies still 
keep their places in the buildings reared by their bounty, 
and the books and professorships founded by their piety 
and patriotism. We miss many of our familiar teachers, 
yet not all have gone ; and it is cheering, indeed, to find 
our own President, who took office in our Freshman year, 
still vigorous as ever, and although no longer in the chair, 
as ready in speech and keen in thought as any man in the 
assembly. There is nothing under heaven more cheerful, 
as well as more venerable, than a ripe and genial old age ; 
and compared with the hearty, sagacious, reverential words 
of the old man, the usual round of jokes seemed flat and 
unprofitable. College Green was greener than ever, and 
the saplings of our day had shot up into tall and stout 
trees. As we were called into the procession, our place 
seemed to be somewhat too near the gray heads of the 
elder classes ; yet we took comfort in this grave feeling by 
walking with very elastic step, and saying, valorously, that 
forty is not quite the prime of life, and that we never felt 
younger than now. I suppose that men always think of 
themselves and their early companions most frequently in 
the form and feature of youth ; and in this sense, as well 
as in others, early impressions are the most enduring. We 
are probably a somewhat careworn set of middle-aged men ; 
yet to each other, we are very much the same as twenty- 
two years ago, when we sang Auld Lang Syne together in 
a brotherly circle, and with clasped hands wished each 
other a " God Speed " upon the great life-journey at hand. 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 39 

A man cannot revisit the place of his education without 
some very wholesome impressions ; and our firm, yet be- 
nign Alma Mater, never so thriving as now, puts to all her 
children some very searching questions as to their disci- 
pline and career, since leaving her favored halls. If some 
unworthy sons may be permitted to counsel their venera- 
ble mother, may they not hint to her the prevailing danger 
in the whole country, of sacrificing the old spiritual 
faith to the new science and arts, and of placing the study 
of physical laws above that Word which made the world, 
and dwelt on earth in the Man Divine ? "We all share, 
especially all theologians and preachers, in the blame of 
this state of things ; and the age itself is prone to count 
all value at the cash price, and of course prize lucrative 
utilities above the goods that are beyond price. Must we 
not believe that science itself, for her own true light and 
life needs the consecration of faith, and that our material 
civilization is but a whited sepulchre when divorced from 
the Spirit which builds up the kingdom of God upon the 
earth ? I know well the difficulty of combining religion 
with education, especially where there are so many rival 
sects contending for the palm ; and it is a fact, that in our 
day, sectarian presses attacked one of the college preach- 
ers for advising some of our class upon the subject of re- 
ligion, and inviting them to become communicants of the 
church. Yet Christianity demands a positive place in 
every scheme of education, and no obstacles should be al- 
lowed to shut it out. In common with not a few friends 
of Harvard, we hope to see an attractive chapel ere long 



4j 



MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 



apon College Green, and an earnest attempt to kindle a 
living Church spirit among the students upon a broad 
Christian platform. In shunning the Pharisee's traditions, 
and the Essene's mysticism, we must remember that the 
Sadducee's worldly conservatism may be a poor exchange 
for either of those superstitions. Yet the ancient faith 
still lives among those hallowed walls, and no new inscrip- 
tions shall blot out from our allegiance the old motto, 
" Christo et Ecclesiae." In some way, not very clear to us 
now, the new science and the old faith shall join hands. 
Surely the learned scholar, and Christian sage now in the 
Presidential chair, is as well entitled as any man to conse- 
crate this union, and his administration will tend, in no 
small degree, to bring it to its consummation at Cambridge. 



III. — A VILLAGE CHURCH. 

Our theological course of three years at the Divinity 
school in Cambridge, seemed in many respects like a con- 
tinuation of the four years' collegiate course. The greater 
liberty allowed us, did not by any means amount to a 
complete emancipation from authoritative discipline, and 
the summons of the bell to prayers or recitation, was about 
as imperious as before our emancipation from the under- 
graduates' restraint. We had eminent and faithful instruc- 
tors, excellent companions, and all access to the best books 
and the best society. Yet after this is said, it must be 
allowed that something is lacking towards the best man- 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 4. 

agement of theological education among us. It is not -well 
to build the school of the prophets directly within the 
shadow of the classic halls, where an over critical under- 
standing is so prone to lord it over the heart of faith, nor 
is it always expedient to continue college associations into 
theological studies. But the gravest of all objections to 
our present method of educating ministers, lies in the ab- 
sence of that church feeling and pastoral life, without 
which, Christianity itself is but a name, and the New Tes- 
tament but a sealed book. We tried in our day to make 
up for the deficiency, and to guard against the cold scho- 
lastic spirit, by doing our part in the real work of life. 
We each tilled our own garden, and made presents of our 
own flowers and melons to friends. We did some mission- 
ary service, and in jails and prisons we sought out the sad 
and benighted. We collected the statistics of benevolence, 
and had reports and debates upon questions of the day. 
We were no strangers to elevated society in parlors as well 
as in students' rooms. Still a great want remained, and it 
is felt more or less in all theological schools. I have 
heard the most eminent mind in the Baptist Church, Dr. 
Wayland, declare himself decidedly opposed to most theolo- 
gical schools, on account of the want of pastoral training, . 
and the predominance of the critical over the devout spirit 
But every human institution is imperfect, and, it may be, 
that the defect of which we are speaking, is only a fair 
share of this imperfection. It is certain, however, that a 
wholly new meaning attached to religion, the moment that 
it presented itself to us in the warmth of parish sympathy 



42 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

and in the earnestness of practical usefulness. Our life 
among the churches threw a new light upon what we had 
read in books. Perhaps the larger number of graduates 
from theological schools settle down at once into the pas 
toral office, whilst others, like the writer, pass a year or 
two in travel and miscellaneous professional service 
These Wander-years, as the Germans would call them, 
are of inestimable value, alike in securing experience, 
health, and literary resources for the pulpit. They must 
md, however, at last, and regular pastoral care must 
begin. 

No subject, except perhaps the Slave question, has 
been handled more frequently of late than that of parish 
life, especially in respect to its trials, and at least a half 
dozen books have been sent out within two or three years, 
claiming as much sympathy for the clerical martyr and his 
consort, as is claimed for Uncle Tom and Aunt Chloe. 
These books probably do good, and will accomplish much 
towards correcting the faults and mistakes of that ruling 
ecclesiastical polity in this country, the individual church 
and its people. The little sketch that I shall try to pencil 
in these few lines, does not ask for a place in the public 
portfolio, but will answer its purpose if it meets the eyes 
of friends not indifferent, and is then forgotten. 

I remember well, shortly after returning from the West 
at the close of my Wandering-years, receiving a visit from 

a most excellent friend, Henry W , who was unable, 

from illness, to fulfil an engagement in the town of N — , 

New Hampshire, and asking me to take his place for a 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 43 

Sabbath. He, poor fellow, never, I believe, stood in the 
pulpit again, and the parish that would otherwise probably 
have been his, became mine for five years. It was on Sat- 
urday, in the middle of June, 1837, that I first visited 

N , and taking the cars to Lowell, glided up the 

Merrimac in a wheezy little steamboat, that was soon to be 
displaced by a railway. It was easy to see, on Sunday 
morning, that the people who gathered together in that 
little Grecian temple, under the trees of the rural ceme- 
tery, were indeed a parish, and not merely a chance assem- 
bly of individuals. There sat the venerable Squire and 
his portly, sagacious lady, with interest evidently almost 
parental, in the welfare of the church. There was the 
young Squire, not son but partner, and likely, it seemed, 
to be son-in-law to the former. There appeared the keen, 
sensible face of the Member of Congress, the leading poli- 
tician of the neighborhood, and ere long to wear a Senator's 
laurels. There too was the worthy Superintendent of the 
Sunday School, with kindness and reverence overflowing 
his face and eyes, to say nothing of his excellent wife, who 
with himself managed to do an amount of good in the 
course of a year, quite sufficient to do honor to a parsonage. 
There was the bookseller, with his temper so sanguine 
whether for a new publication, or a new political move 
and there was the editor, with all the cares of the village 
.paper upon his thoughtful and somewhat anxious face. 
There was the postmaster, with his military honors ; and 
there the cashier of the bank, with his mild yet scruti- 
nizing look. Other characters equally marked, and after- 



44 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

wards to be very important personages in our pastoral 
round, were in their places, and not least among them, ap- 
ceared a goodly proportion of youth and children, the fu- 
ure hope of the flock. There was an air of self-respect, 
mutual kindness, and Christian reverence about the con- 
gregation, that was quite impressive. The singing was 
hearty, and in good taste, under the direction of a tall 
chorister, who evidently magnified his office, and fulfilled 
its duties with a right good will that extended itself to the 
other members of the choir. 

Nothing human is perfect, and of course our parish 
had its faults, faults that were the theme of much perplex- 
ing thought, and vehement exhortation, on the part of the 
pastor. Yet, as the world goes, they were a kindly and 
earnest congregation, not negligent of worship, not slow in 
good works. Surely, so far as their conduct to their pas- 
tor was concerned, all that he can say is, that their for- 
bearance and good-will were wholly beyond his claims or 
deserts. With great individual independence, and exemp- 
tion from merely ritual or dogmatic rigidity, we enjoyed a 
very genial and hearty church life together, and social af- 
fections seemed to flourish quite in proportion to the grow- 
ing love for the sanctuary and its services. The great 
point was to interest the young people, and they answered 
encouragingly to every appeal. Among them, one grea 
truth was exemplified, which is made of little account in 
our scholastic training, the truth that the power of religion 
in a ehurch, depends as much upon the receptive and devo- 
tional element in the people, as in the intellectual or active 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 4D 

element. A company of docile children, or impressible 
young people, or a few really devout men and women in a 
parish, have an effect over the pastor and the whole sphere 
of church life, which cannot he estimated in language. 
The Divine Word, like the luminary to which it corre- 
sponds, has its virtue drawn out by the lowly plant, more 
than by the flinty rock, and the gifts of Grod in nature are 
constantly illustrating the gospel doctrine, that divine 
grace is given in the measure of human need and yearn- 
ing. In looking to my first parish, I must own that I feel 
a profound gratitude, especially towaids those waiting, 
lowly minds, who blessed the pastor more than any courtly 
patronage could do, simply by allowing him to serve them, 
and by expecting of him that direct usefulness, which is a 
minister's highest duty and richest blessing. In some 
cases, the sick and the dying evidently exercised, directly 
or indirectly, a commanding influence upon the whole con- 
gregation, even as some herb almost too lowly to meet the 
eye, will gather from the sun, and earth, and air, a healing 
and diffusive grace, that is not to be found in the rose's 
beauty or the oak's strength. 

Many a baptism and communion in that embowered 
church comforted the worshippers by the assurance of new 
zeal and sympathy among the people. A very genial, 
social life prevailed ; and the quite frugal and republican 
manners of the community combined with the good exam- 
ple of the chief citizens to keep up a style of visiting and 
entertaining, quite in contrast with the usual petty os- 
tentation and exclusiveness of small places. It was a 



46 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

cheering time when the parish came in a body to visit the 
minister. He lived in priestly isolation, a bachelor ; yet 
his lot was not desperate. A kind neighbor lent him for 
the occasion a large house adjacent to his lodgings, and 
the young people of the parish made it a bower of flowers 
from the produce of their gardens, whilst the notable 
housekeepers loaded the tables with all manner of good 
cheer for young and old. The evening was auspicious; 
the whole congregation came with their most cheerful 
looks, and the occasion, in its social cordiality and Chris- 
tian tone, was one that Fenelon himself would have thought 
worthy of his smile and his benediction. Not a few guests 
came from neighboring parishes in town, and this was one 
of the least of the indications of the good feeling that pre- 
vailed between the various congregations and their pastors. 
I have never seen a more neighborly state of society than 
that which prevailed in our village alike among pastors and 
people during those years. We freely co-operated together 
in all matters of public spirit, especially education ; and 
one of the most welcome reminiscences of parish life in the 
country, is connected with the teachers and scholars of the 
schools, all of whom I knew quite well, from those in the 
brick temple of learning in the centre of the town, to those 
in the wooden ten-footer in the outskirts. 

There is in many quarters a disposition to underrate 
the population of our manufacturing towns. But a fair 
observation must satisfy any candid man, that these towns 
certainly in New England have their full share of intelli- 
gence and character. I mingled very freely with the opera- 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 47 

tives of every grade, and had a considerable number of 
them in the parish. It is simple truth to say, that I have 
never known a more exemplary class of persons. The 
oung men were very desirous of improving alike in know- 
ledge and principles, and no appeal to them for help in any 
good word or work was unanswered. I have kept especial 
account of a little knot of young men who used to meet 
together for conversation and inquiry, and it has been 
very cheering to note their respectability and progress. 
A few weeks ago I met one of this set at Springfield, Mass., 
and found that he had risen gradually frcm his subordinate 
place in the mill, to the charge of a manufacturing estab- 
lishment of a thousand operatives. The whole retrospect 
of those years, in the manufacturing village, is eminently 
cheering in respect to the fortunes of enterprising and 
capable young men. Wherever situated, the American 
youth who croaks over the obstacles in the way of his 
rising, and gives himself to despair and idleness, is too 
chicken-hearted to use success even if forced upon him. 

I do not care to say with what feelings that little 
Church was resigned for another charge, and how many 
wistful yearnings have, from time to time, been sent back 
to those years of comparative retirement. The neighbor- 
ing city and large towns never seemed more attractive and 
edifying than when revisited, for a few days, after a season 
of hard work in the country. How delightful was the 
elect circle of brethren that met together every two months 
for professional sympathy ; and each man went back with 
double heart from this chosen fellowship, always very sure 



48 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

of preaching an uncommonly living sermon the next Sun- 
day. What a privilege it was to join occasionally a con- 
versational club in Boston, where the choicest spirits spoke 
freely their best thoughts, and Channing himself was a fre- 
quent guest. He was emphatically kind and encouraging 
to young men, and he used to inquire as earnestly about 
my unpretending charge, and listen as respectfully to my 
poor words, as if humanity were to him the same every 
where, and whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing 
well, whether in a small sphere or a large one. In that club 
the progressive spirit prevailed, and not a little of the trans- 
cendental philosophy figured in the conversation. Behind 
none of the most zealous reformers in his zeal, and earnest 
as any transcendentalist for the spiritual worth of every 
soul, Channing never failed to show his strict allegiance 
to the gospel, and on one occasion maintained, at consid- 
erable length, his conviction of the permanent ministry of 
Jesus Christ to the human family, and of his actual pres- 
ence with believers, especially at the season of communion. 
A familiar poet has told us that, 

" Lands intersected by a narrow frith, 
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed 
Make enemies of nations, who had else 
Like kindred drops been mingled into one." 

and sad to say, not long after my leaving, that village was 
divided into two jealous towns, on account of the little 
stream that flowed so tranquilly through its domain, and 
preached peace with every ripple as it turned the mill- 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 49 

wheels that created the general wealth. In trying to locate 
the new town-house, the citizens quarrelled, and preferred 
having two town-houses to giving the prerogative to the 
rival side of the river. In a few years, however, the old 
good neighborhood, confirmed by not a few inducements 
from mutual interest and public pride, returned, and a city 
charter was the reasonable pretext for uniting the two sides 
of the river into one efficient community. Great indeed 
was the joy when this was done ; and I am not ashamed 
to say, that when word came to me of its consummation 
last year, I felt much disposed to run to the door, to an- 
nounce the fact to the people in the street, and was obliged 
to sober the enthusiasm by remembering that a policeman 
lived opposite, and that New York cares too little even 
about its own affairs to care very much about other places, 
great or small. 

It is a great privilege to go from time to time to the 
old place, and hunt up the scenes and friends that cannot 
be forgotten. The cemetery in which our church stands 
has many voices to the visitor's memory, that chime well 
with the whisper of the winds through the trees that over- 
shadow the graves. A large portion of the congregation 
that I met in the church the first Sunday there, that has 
been spoken of, have gone from their habitual seats, and 
laid down to their rest under the green sod. The good 
S.quire and his wife, the former not long after the latter, 
have gone in the peace of a firm faith, and their names 
are pointed out to the young as household words, in every 
family where the husband's neighborly kindness, and the 
3 



50 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

wife's careful thought, are as fresh as the day. This 
couple were more than legislators to the community in 
which they lived, since social influence is stronger than 
written law, and the peacemaker, and the housewife, who 
give the true tone to the whole neighborhood, scatter good 
seed that lives long after they have gone. The young law- 
yer, too, has gone to his rest. F was my most inti- 
mate friend and a constant helper, a man of keen intellect, 
fine taste, acute, and in some respects, morbid sensibility, 
an accomplished scholar, a graceful writer, a learned and 
able lawyer, an upright and influential politician. He 
overworked his powers in codifying the State laws, and 
sought in the air of Spain, the Mediterranean, and Egypt, 
the health that he was never to find. We used to hunt 
the first spring flower, the Epigsea Repens, together, and 
that fragrant and unobtrusive plant, in its fragrance, in its 
early bloom, and its tenacious grasp, is no inapt memento 

of F 's gifts, and his fate. I shall never forget the 

one political idea that was most prominent in his creed. 
He always maintained that the first danger to this country 
was in the centralization of government and influence, and 
that just as surely as great sums of money are placed in 
the hands of the Cabinet or Congress, to be disbursed for 
pet local enterprises, just so surely will all manner of pec- 
ulation be fostered, and Washington will become a nest of 
manoeuvring jobbers. Every year of the nation is but il- 
lustrating the justice of this idea, by revealing some new 
depth of the knavery and covetousness of public men. 
Not far from the grave of this young lawyer, rests the 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 51 

dust of the Senator who has been already named. Just 
as great wealth was poured into his lap, and he was made 
the leader of the dominant party in the national Senate 
with any office in the gift of the Cabinet apparently open 
to his grasp, he was stricken down speechless and ere long 
died. He was an accomplished man, a very shrewd ob- 
server of character, far more cautious than sanguine, a cool 
and sagacious calculator of political probabilities, and pro- 
bably, at the time of his death, the most influential public 
man in the State. He was a courteous and agreeable pa- 
rishioner, instructive and genial in conversation, and al- 
though very little of a devotee or enthusiast, he was very 
ready to assert the necessity of religion to human nature, 
and to sustain by his presence and means its public insti- 
tutions. There was somewhat of a sarcastic element in 
his nature, and he was the last man whose name I should 
have associated with the vagaries of the New Spiritualism. 
Yet I have heard of quite an elaborate communication to 
his old pastor, professing to come from him since he left 
the body, and without stopping to discuss the philosophy 
of spiritualism, it is enough to say that if my shrewd and 
somewhat cynical friend indeed dictated that letter from 
the spiritual world, he has singularly changed his tone. 
There is much that is very marvellous in the late letter- 
writing and table-tipping movements, but I should value 
far more such a return of my intelligent friend's spirit, as 
comes to me from revisiting the favorite haunts of our 
walks and talks, in the woods and by the river side, than 
any of the revelations of the new magic. It is probably 



52 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

true that the alleged communications from the spiritual 
world which are now so prominent, will be found to illus- 
trate the power of the mind in acting upon itself, and in 
mistaking its subjective impressions for objective realities. 
A volume might be written upon the Pythian element in 
our nature, which would throw light upon many other ora- 
cles than that of Delphi. We will not turn from oui 
musing in the cemetery, however, to follow these specula- 
tions. The thought uppermost in mind, is, of course, the 
great instability of human life, for in less than twenty 
years, a large company of persons well known to me, have 
gone here to their rest, and the names upon the grave 
stones win an easier recognition, than many names that 
now mark the living worshippers in the church. Yet the 
world does not stop its motion, however many or con- 
spicuous are her sons and daughters who cease to be. The 
little river runs in front of the cemetery as merrily as ever, 
and turns thousands of spindles, quite as eager as ever in 
the whirl for gold. There too, in the distance, Old Mo- 
nadnock lifts his bald head to the heavens, indifferent as 
fate itself to the beauty of the ever-returning stars, and 
to the sighing of the restless winds, and to the toil and 
trouble among the pigmies who worry themselves to death 
in his valleys. Along new roads of iron, fresh crowds 
hurry to and fro upon their round of pleasure or business, 
and a new generation of children come to church to learn 
their catechism under the guidance of grave elders who 
were children or youth twenty years ago. Under such im- 
pressions a man feels himself within the grasp of an inex* 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAT. 53 

orable destiny, that seems hurrying him away in its fated 
march, utterly indifferent to the joy or sorrow, life or 
death, of the individual, and careful only that laws and 
races shall be preserved. What is life, and what is death, 
without a Comforter beyond the world, beyond nature and 
man — a Comforter who can lead us to Him, who cares for 
each soul with a parent's love, and through the wreck of 
matter and the fall of nations, will preserve unto life eter- 
nal the soul that trusts in His love ? Such a Comforter 
speaks from the Word in that sanctuary, to that dust in 
the cemetery. 



IV. — CITY EXPERIENCES. 

Each community, like each individual, has a character 
of its own that cannot be measured by size or figures, and 
it is very obvious, that if the Apostle Paul should make 
the circuit of American cities, he would have a word for 
each of them, quite as characteristic as any that he ad- 
dressed to the Galatians or the Romans, to the people of 
Corinth or Ephesus. Surely he would find occasion for all 
his insight and sagacity, in dealing with our two chief 
Northern cities, Boston and New York, and perhaps in 
gome respects the intermediate thriving little metropolis 
of' Rhode Island, might task his acuteness and tact quite 
as much as any place ever visited by him in his mission 
through the empire of the Caesars. If most communities 
are proud of certain distinguishing traits in their manners 



54 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

and institutions, the Rhode Islander carries the individual- 
ity a step farther, and believes in every man's being a man- 
ner, institution, and character to himself. Bostonians and 
New Yorkers, of the genuine stamp, are not very difficult 
to be denned, and their dress and furniture indicate their 
distinctive characteristics tolerably well. But gather to- 
gether fifty regular Rhode Islanders, select them if you 
please, any day, out of Westminster, or Benefit, or Water 
street, in Providence, from the men over forty years old, 
and you will have about as many original characters as 
you have individual specimens. The idiosyncrasy is not 
confined to the ruder sex, but walks in silk quite as em- 
phatically as in broadcloth. Enter a choice coterie of 
knowing women, generally having a large and valuable 
proportion of those who have never consented to narrow 
the largeness of their sympathies and ideas by any domes- 
tic fetters, and you will find that Roger Williams has 
daughters as well as sons who scorn all subjection to 
priestly prescription or social tradition. More than one 
affable matron will broach, with full confidence, her own 
theory for the reorganization of society, no matter what 
Plato or the Pope may say to the contrary ; and more than 
one eloquent maiden will set forth a system of metaphysics 
emanating from her own intuitions, no matter what Emer- 
son may whisper with his honeyed persuasion, or Carlyle 
may growl with his savage humanity. No extreme of po- 
litical conservatism appears to take away the least of a 
genuine Rhode Islander's individuality of thinking and 
acting. The solid Chief Justice, who was called by the^ 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 55 

thorough-going radicals, the very Jeffries of judicial con- 
servatism and rigor, no sooner quits the bench and enters 
his study, than lo ! the severe magistrate has become the 
most adventurous of metaphysicians. He is ready to show 
how time and space exist, and the universe is made, ever 
anew by man the microcosm. The Pan-Idea of the Rhode 
Island Chief Justice, exhibits speculative daring enough, 
to make a regiment of the common order of political radi- 
cals scamper with affright, if they do not first fall down 
dizzy with the vain attempt at comprehension. 

A stubborn individualism has been, in some respects, 
the strength, and in other respects, the weakness, of Rhode 
Island. It has raised up many remarkable characters, and 
giveu a peculiar life to private enterprise ; but it has stood 
much in the way of proper public spirit, and of efficient 
associate effort, until of late. Of late, a new day has 
come over the State, and apparently from the very tenden- 
cy that has so long worked in the old direction. The want 
of due conciliation led to the recent sad feud, and this very 
feud led to a kind of combination and sense of citizenship 
that have widened into a broader and better public spirit, 
than before was known, and which has in fact taken at last 
some of the bitterest political antagonists within its larg 
embrace. Probably none of the old States of the Union ha 
improved so much as Rhode Island within ten or fifteen 
years. Schools, Libraries, Academies, Art, Industry, Col- 
legiate education, all have taken a new start, and there is 
apparently no place in the whole country that secures to a 
right-minded citizen a larger average of social, literary and 



56 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

religious privilege, than the city of Providence I can say 
from pretty thorough experience and observation, that no 
man who has taken root there among books and friends, 
pleasant scenery and good institutions, willingly seeks 
another home. 

Perhaps the last thing expected to come from the 
threatened civil war was such a result as actually came. 
There was a fearful state of feeling for about a year of my 
residence there. It was a strange and startling transition 

from the peaceful village of N to the rule of martial 

law. We indeed had our soldiers in the country, and 
I had there taken my turn as chaplain in asking Hea- 
ven's blessing on the brigades before their attack upon 
the collation, or the summons to the sham fight. The 

commander of our crack company in N , an artillery 

corps a hundred strong, had heard real bullets whistle 
during the war of 1812; yet in spite of his frequent de- 
sires to bleed for his country, he was a most pacific Christian 
man, and his voice had been trained to its sonorous pitch 
more by the exhortations of the Conference Meeting than 
by the passions of the camp. It was very evident that 
playing soldier is a very different thing from being soldier, 
and that during that crisis in Rhode Island, so far as the 
feeling was concerned, men were now quite ready to meet 
a bloody crisis. The scenes in the streets, the troops, 
bayonets, cannon, munitions, were not the worst of the 
evil. The greatest sufferers were those, who from their 
homes, waited the fearful tidings that were anticipated. 
The alarm bells that made the night more than dismal, 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 57 

Btruck more panic into the wife and daughter in the house 
than into the armed man in the street or field. But a 
trifle was needed, a chance discharge of a musket, or a 
spark of fire upon a field-piece, to have kindled at once a 
civil war, whose extent and horrors no man could calculate. 
But no such mishap occurred. The revolutionary passion 
cooled and died out without the convulsion of a fatal crisis. 
" Nothing," says a keen Frenchman, " succeeds so well as 
success ; " and notwithstanding all the rhodomontade to 
the contrary, Rhode Island has been uniting and consoli- 
dating her resources since that time, under laws that ap- 
pear to have the countenance of leading men from both the 
old belligerent parties. Probably the old Charter of King 
Charles never did the State more good than in the convul- 
sions of its final gasp. 

Merciful Heaven sent to some of us a blessed anodyne 
to the war fever, in the arrival of the librarian of Brown 
University with a great collection of choice books from 
Europe. Professor Jewett, with his ten thousand tomes, 
did more to calm some troubled spirits, than the iPaixhan 
guns and the Horse G-uards. The College Library became 
a charmed place of resort, and supplied in the classics and 
modern languages all the deficiencies left by the admirable 
English Library of the citizens' Athenaeum. The Presi- 
dent's emphatic figure was no unusual sight among the 
books. It needed few words only to prove the weight of 
his mind. He is the Cromwell among our College digni- 
taries — a sturdy Independent, in religion utterly opposed to 
every form of priestcraft in America, and touching with uc 
3* 



58 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

feeble hand the springs of anti-prelatical Protestantism 
among the Missions of India. He is an academic radical, 
yet a firm disciplinarian, and leads off the collegiate revo- 
lution, now going on in the land, by bringing into the field 
to cope with those old cavaliers of letters, the Classics, 
those pugnacious Roundheads, the gases, metals, mechanic 
powers, and the whole rank and file of physical science and 
art, determined, as he is, to educate boys to do the head 
work of the manufacturer, engineer, merchant and me- 
chanic, as well as the learned professions. 

It is sometimes as hard to regulate a parish as a State, 
and more than one minister has found the dogged inde- 
pendence of Williams too strong in his descendants to 
move parishioners to that cohesive zeal which does as much 
for the edifying of the church, as for the comfort of the 
pastor. With one minister whom we well knew, the great 
question was, how to mould the stanch individualities at 
the heads of the pews into a homogeneous active body. 
The men were indeed faithful to whatever they undertook, 
always true to their word, abounding in the business virtues, 
not wanting in liberality of purse, yet strikingly wanting in 
what Bushnell calls churchly life, especially in regard to the 
Christian ordinances. Their creed was, in some respects 
more from Zeno, with his stout will, than from St. Paul, with 
his devout faith ; and it became a pressing question how to 
win them to warmer church feeling, to kindle the senti- 
ment of Christian communion, and to nurture that evan- 
gelical tenderness, which is as essential to the welfare of a 
congregation, as to the peace of the soul. Kind Heaven 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 59 

helped him out of the difficulty, by raising up a new parish 
from the teachers and scholars of the Sunday School. 
He tried to do what he could for the men, and certainly 
he had for them great respect and affection ; but his hope 
for the devotional life of the church was in great part from 
the young, and the comfort and aid which he found from 
them alike in social and religious relations, gave new 
strength to his own labors, and in due time wrought a 
change in the whole sphere of the parish. As much was 
accomplished in the Sunday School room as in the church, 
and no scenes of pastoral life are more gratefully remem- 
bered, than the cheerful and earnest reunions of scores of 
young people at the parsonage for social fellowship and re- 
ligious instruction. Thus, what he could not do of him- 
self, he tried to do by new recruits ; and in some cases, 
they who were proof against the minister's appeals, sur- 
rendered their indifference before the little host of their 
own children that were brought into the field. It was re- 
served, however, for the next minister, an admirable 
scholar — an exquisite writer — to do a work far more re- 
markable, and not attempted before. Surely he must 
have great powers of persuasion, who could induce those 
units of manly independence to coalesce into something of 
ritual unity, and say litanies, psalms, and collects together 
quite after the old church method. Our good old deacon, 
whose love for this church and its people was a part of his 
very life, was opposed to having the Commandments set up 
in the sanctuary, as the pastor desired, because it looked, 
he said, so much like Episcopacy. "What would he say, 



60 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

could he see the reading desk and prayer-book that are 
now fixtures of the altar ? But whatever the outward fix- 
tures are, we may be sure that there are other fixtures of a 
deeper kind that abide through all administrations. I can 
never think or speak of the city of Roger Williams and of 
the people there best known, without remembrances that 
make the changing years more blessed as they pass. Here, 
in this rural nook, from among the trees, the waters of 
Long Island Sound are full in sight, and many of the white 
sails that flit by in the distance will not cease their course 
until they are furled in front of familiar counting-rooms, 
and watched by the passers by on the Weybosset Bridge, so 
often trodden by our own and our friends' feet. Nearer to 
the writer's shady arbor, now some more lively mementoes 
of that city are to be found. Two sprightly girls are 
gamboling upon the lawn, with a greyhound for a play- 
fellow, who remember Providence with a birthright affec- 
tion, and who cannot be induced by any of the wonders of 
the new home in the greater city to renounce their first 
love. 

The greater city — our huge, tumultuous, impassioned 
New York — the home of all faiths and practices, creeds 
and characters — what shall we say of it, who have tried to 
scrutinize its ways carefully, and who, in spite of our many 
misgivings at too prevalent faults, must in truth confess 
our great attachment to the place and people so hospitable 
to us as strangers, and so friendly to us, now strangers no 
more. Probably few thoughtful men ever came to New 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY 61 

York, or to any like enormous city, of their own accord, 
from a more tranquil and stable home. There is some- 
thing at first desolate in the aspect of a great city to a 
visitor who has been used to live in a community where 
most of the people are acquaintances, and no small portion 
of them are his friends. The open ocean or the unbroken 
forest, hardly gives a greater sense of loneliness than the 
presence of a vast crowd of strangers, to whom we are so 
utterly unknown, that if we dropped down in the street, 
the incident would be of no especial interest to any body, 
except, perhaps, to some newspaper reporter on the look- 
out for items for his chapter of accidents. It is usually 
some prevailing train of circumstances not of his own de- 
vising, that brings the quiet provincial to the great city in 
the current which draws such vast and heterogeneous num- 
bers into the remorseless whirlpool. Yet ere long the 
novice begins to be reconciled to the throng. He is no 
longer made dizzy by the swaying crowd, and the hum of 
the busy streets seems to him little more than the swell 
of the sea to the sailor, or the murmur of the forest to the 
backwoodsman. He forms a kind of general acquaintance 
with the city and people, whilst he has friends enough at 
home and abroad to assure him that he is a man among kind- 
y men, and not a solitary unit in the general mass. Many 
of our satisfactions depend upon contrasts, and the con- 
trast between the view of the great crowd of strangers and 
the recognition of our own acquaintances, gives us a min- 
gled pleasure quite peculiar from its union of novelty with 
familiarity, very much as when friends journey together 



62 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

in foreign lands, constantly enjoying new scenes with old 
affections. 

Our better sensibilities are more in danger in the great 
city than we can well define. The amount of misery in 
the general crowd, and in cases making an especial appeal, 
creates a draught upon the sympathies that threatens 
either to craze a man with solicitude, or to harden him 
into desperation and indifference. I have lived years 
in a community where the sum total of poverty and suffer- 
ing could be easily measured, and quite effective relief 
could be given at once to every needy family. In our 
neighborhood there was one town so thriving, that charity 
had to go begging for objects of its bounty ; and after a 
public festival, the managers were unable to think of a 
single family in the place who would not feel themselves 
insulted by the bestowal of the dainties remaining from 
the feast. In New York, such a fact seems the most mon- 
strous of absurdities ; for there every stray rag or bone 
has a claimant, and misery has legions that no man has 
numbered, and no man can fully relieve. The necessity 
of discriminating between honest want and knavish preten- 
sion, where begging is a trade, and imposture is a profes- 
sion, lays a perilous snare for the conscience, by affording 
selfishness the easy excuse of deceit. But do our part as 
well as we may to relieve suffering, we cannot do every 
thing ; and there is a constant array of sufferers before our 
eyes, that must harrow the sensibilities, if they do not 
harden the heart. In fact, the problem is still unsettled 
as to the fate of the heart in a great city. Not the least 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAY. 63 

of its perils is the frequency of dramatic and romantic ap- 
peals to the feelings by the theatre and the opera, the 
newspaper and the novel, that tend to make real want re- 
pulsive in comparison with , the more fascinating victims of 
the plot or the story. Yet God is every where, and the 
man who tries to keep within his love, and to do good to 
his neighbor according to opportunity, will find that Divine 
Providence rules over city as over village, and the dews 
of heavenly grace are ready to descend upon both. 

One experience has struck me since living in the great 
city, which has not been remarked upon with sufficient 
emphasis. It is the sense of the absolute need of religion, 
not merely as a source of spiritual life and hope, but as a 
safeguard against the craving excitement and perpetual 
unrest of the current world of business and pleasure. A 
man needs here the rest of a divine faith, as much as he 
needs the cooling water or the soothing pillow. It is very 
clear to me that all thoughtful people are conscious of this 
want, and that their decided attachment to church worship, 
especially to its directly devotional elements, is proof of a 
craving for the peace that is not of this world. It is not 
uncommon to hear New York spoken of as a very irreli- 
gious city ; but a fair inspection will reveal among the 
regular, and especially the American, residents, as large 
a proportion of devotional sentiment and practical benevo- 
lence, as any large community in the land can show. It 
would be a dismal confession of shallowness and conceit, 
for a man to call any great city truly Christian ; but truth 
and candor forbid our joining in the poor disposition of 



64 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

many critics, to purchase self-complacency by the whole- 
sale condemnation of neighbors. 

Without God and Christ, and the Divine Spirit, wha 
are we in the great tumult, the fearful play of fortune, 
character, life, death ? The heavenly mercy never deserts 
us, and always offers some blessing suited to the peculiar 
trials of our position. He who sent Jesus Christ to Jeru- 
salem and Capernaum, and Paul to Antioch, Corinth, 
Athens and Rome, has not deserted his people, nor shut 
up his grace within any village walls. A man of devout 
disposition will feel his heart drawn more tenderly to the 
mercy-seat, and more into harmony with the great masters 
of the devout life, from the very tumult and unrest around 
him. Every sorrow has its providential remedy ; and to 
those who live in cities there is balm in Gilead, and a 
Divine Physician there. Surely, he who wishes to appre- 
ciate the majestic Quietists like a Kempis, Fenelon, and 
other peers who have learned so profoundly the peace that 
is in Jesus, will find himself quite as much quickened and 
subdued into a congenial temper, by seeking that rest 
divine near to the mighty heart of the great city, as when 
within the calmest rural retreat under shady arbors that 
offer tranquillity, yet tempt indolence. 

The season of respite from the usual round of labor 
now closes, and the writer puts by his errant pen for 
toil less a pastime, and, perhaps, more a utility. Let 
not the reader call him an idler or egotist, for passing 
some of these leisure days in reminiscences of scenes and 



COMPANIONS BY THE WAT. 65 

friends that seemed to present themselves of their own 
accord, to be sketched. If his own mood shall seize others 
with a kindred fit of retrospection, they will be in better 
frame to survey for themselves the landmarks of their 
career. Is it out of place for him to wish his friends and 
readers a happy life-journey, whose Mile Stones draw ever 
nearer the Eternal Home? 

Fairfield, Conn., August 30, 1864 



€>aYs §taMg 011 % $amt%. 



Now that the sun is beaming bright, 

Implore we, bending low, 
That He, the Uncreated Light, 

May gaide us as we go. 

No sinful word, nor deed of wrong, 

Nor thoughts t^at idly rove, 
But simple truth be on our tongue, 

*ud ir our hearts be love 

Ami grant that to tnlne honor, liOrd, 

Our daily toil may tend ; 
That we begin it at thy word, 

And in thy favor end. 

St. Ambeose. 



GOD'S BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY. 

It is well for a man to keep sacredly his own birth-day, 
and to give serious thought to the tenor of the momentous 
life, whose beginning he celebrates. There is a place for 
festivity, the most genial festivity in the occasion, and in 
a thoughtful, affectionate family, the least child will learn 
to welcome the little round of anniversaries, that bring 
the greetings in due turn to each member of the home cir- 
cle. But the festivity is vain, and worse than vain, if it 
does not spring from a cheerful sense of the solemn mean- 
ing of existence, and the gift of life is not held in reverent 
trust from Him who is the Father of our spirits. We begin 
these thoughts upon the life-journey by asking his blessing 
upon our career. What better topic can we have than 
that of prayer, not a separate prayer for some single bless 
ing, but the prayer that cares for all our needs, and lays 
them all before the mercy-seat. 

Human life is a constant want, and ought to be a con- 
stant prayer. 



70 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

It is a constant want, certainly. Who is not always 
wanting something? They that have no money, want 
some ; they that have much, want more. The beggar begs 
bead at the prince's kitchen; the prince hunts the world 
through in search of a new pleasure. The captive weeps 
for the free air, and his own home ; the conqueror, whose 
chattel he has become, weeps that there are no more worlds 
to conquer. Life is surely a constant want. 

Nor does any superiority of culture or character, take 
from life this attendant. In fact, the best mind has the 
most wants, and in place of every foolish whim or base ap- 
petite renounced, many refined tastes and aspirations are 
sure to come. The Christian, by the very fact of his faith 
and purpose, wants more and better things than any world- 
ling possibly can. He is content with a frugal table and 
limited purse, yet he claims an ever increasing interest in 
all true goods ; with an undying yearning he wants what- 
ever is pure and lovely under God's providence ; nay, he 
wants Grod himself, the Infinite and Eternal Gi-ood, for his 
Friend and Comforter. 

So Christ came, not to do the Stoic's work for man by 
blunting the sensibilities, but to carry out the Creator's 
work by quickening every sense and faculty, to make life 
a constant prayer for a blessing ever enlarging. The word 
of the Messiah calls man to receive, in the whole compass 
of his being, the good that Grod's love provides. The 
word is : " Ask, and it shall be given ; seek, and ye shall 
find ; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." Remember 
this saying as we continue our meditation. 



god's blessing on the journey. 71 

What does this teach, "but a prayer as comprehensive 
as life itself — a prayer in word, indeed, but more than 
that — one in thought and action also. Let us think of 
it in its chief points of duty and privilege. 

It begins with asking. " Ask, and ye shall receive." 
Then the method of discipline which the earthly parent 
adopts, the Heavenly Father has ordained. The child of 
man learns by asking, and it is so also with the child of 
God, in that discipline that does not end with childhood or 
youth. The prayer of asking is commerded to us then by 
the most obvious of analogies. Whatever good we want 
from God we are to ask for, especially that good which is 
peculiar to his own being and action, the good that is 
moral and spiritual — the light for our guidance, the 
strength for our path, the peace for our trial. 

But does any one say that the analogy breaks down 
just in the most essential point? The parent does not 
know what a child wants, and therefore needs often to be 
asked, but God knows all our wants, and therefore needs 
no asking. The objection is plausible, but not sound. It 
is not merely the parent's ignorance of a child's wants that 
requires the expression of the want, but it is the parent's 
desire for an obedient, respectful temper in the child. 
Right asking is of itself an action having a moral quality, 
and entitling the asker to benefits not otherwise appropri- 
ate. It acts at once upon the disposition of him who 
asks, and upon the administration of him who gives. 

So, then, we claim for the prayer of asking, an effect 



72 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

twofold — or, in the language once metaphysical but now 
popular, an effect both subjective and objective — acting 
upon man and upon God. It acts upon man. Intellec- 
tually speaking, what habit strengthens and invigorates the 
faculty more than the habit of reducing our vague thoughts 
and feelings to distinct forms ? By words, in fact, we learn 
to think ; and he who does not speak or write his mind, be- 
comes a vain dreamer. It is not, of course, merely audible 
language that we insist upon, but distinct, clearly conscious 
prayer, spoken or unspoken. It collects the thoughts, and 
quickens the attention, to bring a definite prayer before the 
mercy-seat. They who slight this fact, and substitute 
meditation for prayer, will soon substitute reverie for 
meditation, and let reverie run wild at the mercy of every 
idle fancy. 

Morally, it acts upon man. It makes him feel the be- 
nignant and solemn presence of God, thus to review his 
own wants before him, and implore the Almighty to grant 
him the good he needs. To speak to a fellow-creature 
brings him near to us, and of itself is an act so expressive, 
as often to call for no little conflict with our timidity. To 
bring our petition before the Infinite and Eternal One 
with any kind of seriousness and reverence — how can it 
but subdue the will and rebuke the passions, and confirm 
the faith and exalt the affections ? 

But is this all ? Is man helped by prayer, solely by 
the effect of it, as an exercise of his thought and feeling ? 
The Bible does not read so — nor the best experience teach 
so — nor a judicious philosophy intimate so. Nay, prayer 



god's blessing on the journey. 73 

loses its power as an intellectual and moral exercise, if 
pursued merely as such, and the devotees of a cold ration- 
alism soon weary of the spiritual gymnastics that aim only 
to stir their own faculties. The gospel teaches the power 
of prayer to win good from God, and the experience of all 
ages and lives illustrates the truth of the doctrine. But 
look to the very nature of things — the nature of the soul, 
and the attributes of God. Are not all the best gifts of 
Heaven contingent upon some act of man ? The earth is 
the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; but must not man sow 
and reap and garner, in order to enjoy the harvest ? Nay 
the simplest and most essential gifts, light, water, air, man 
truly enjoys, only when he truly uses. Shall any earth- 
born philosophy presume to say, in the face of revelation 
and experience, that in the mysterious region in which 
God moves, this law of conditionality so entirely ceases, 
that no thought nor effort of the soul can win any peculiar 
blessing from the Father of our spirits ? Absurd idea ! 
Far better the philosophy of the Bible, which says, draw 
nigh unto God, and God will draw nigh unto you. Then 
lift to God the asking prayer. Let our word breathe our 
want and win his blessing. Our word to man bears some- 
thing from us, and brings something from him. Our word 
to God — it shall not be in vain, and may win the kindest 
return, when unanswered to the ear or to the impatient 
sense. Let the word of prayer begin with our first con- 
scious want, rise with our growth, and deepen with our ex- 
perience. So we understand the life-prayer in its first and 
most obvious form — asking. 
4 



74 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY 

This first leads to the second, and implies it. Asking 
is, in fact, a form of seeking, and suggests all forms. De- 
pending upon God, craving his blessing, not in the pride 
of our own self-will, we are to search out the true way of 
life. Seeking it of God, we find. The living prayer of the 
true seeker, has a twofold virtue, acting upon his own 
mind and upon the paths of Providence. It acts upon the 
mind of the man. He who seeks for any good, real or 
imagined, is successful very much according to the spirit 
in which he seeks, whether pure and wise or the reverse. 
The common proverb says, that necessity is the mother of 
invention. Say rather, that desire is the mother of inven- 
tion, and the vision is always keen in the direction of the 
ruling love. See the gold-hunter — what perils of man and 
nature he braves to win the shining dust, and what trifles 
to a common eye, are, to his sharp sight, signs of the pre- 
cious ore. See the angler with his line, the hunter with 
his gun, the naturalist in search of bird, insect, or mineral, 
how sagaciously each finds the path to what he seeks. 
Nay, the very inventive genius that has changed the face 
of the earth, and marked lands and oceans with its tri- 
umphs, what is it but the result of the desire of material 
goods, so characteristic of modern times ? The inventor 
is a seeker, and the useful arts all are his findings. These 
are well, but not the best. A man may have them all and 
be wretched. The great discovery, is that which opens 
the path of divine peace and strength. He finds it, who 
seeks it by studying devoutly the mind of its Maker, and 
has his way in God as he walks the highways and byways 



of life. No man has exhausted this discovery, or learned 
to see the paths of usefulness and enjoyment which every 
day brings near. The sense for them is keen, as our sense 
of God's love is tender. We understand a fine estate, by 
knowing the mind of the proprietor, and all is clear as we 
walk through the grounds and halls in his company. Who 
shall presume, without devout communion with God, grate- 
ful sense of his wisdom and love, to learn the true uses of 
his wonderful domain ? Who can seek wisely the ways of 
life without the Divine Guide ? 

Nor does the good stop here, with the effect on the 
seeker's own powers. Providence helps him with peculiar 
aids. We are not among those who are fond of dogmati- 
zing upon particular Providences, or presuming to know 
all of God's meaning in any of the events of life. Much 
less are we in favor of interpreting our times as if our own 
community or fortune were the chief thing in view of the 
Most High. But, certainly, without such presumption, we 
may acknowledge a providential hand in shaping the ways 
of life, in some measure, according to the seeker's aims. 
This is certainly Christian doctrine, and a faith which 
every trusting mind craves for its best peace and power. 
Who shall gainsay it ? What philosopher of history pre 
sumes to shut God out from the lead of events ? What 
observer of life in all its varied opportunities, dares to as- 
sert any fatality so rigid, as to exclude the working of the 
Infinite Spirit ? Nay, let a man study his own life, and 
remember how peculiarly events have been ordered for 
him, how he has been led to the most important measures 



76 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

of his experience, how strangely strength has come from 
disappointment, and good from trial, how many times 
great results have depended upon influences from nature 
from human feeling, from some word or impression that 
might be wholly providential. Experience will then be 
ready to answer to the gospel doctrine, and, whilst not 
disparaging human effort in choosing the way, will say 
after all, that our way is to be sought in God, and to be 
found of him. God is in history, or history is the Bible 
of Atheism. God is in the paths of life, or life is without 
God in the world. No business nor profession is well, 
without this trust to guide its work and to dispose its 
gains. The business and profession common to all — our 
calling of God as the creatures of his power and the sub- 
jects of his kingdom — falls at once, if we lose hold of his 
guiding hand. 

So we interpret the promise to the seeker, that his 
mind is readier for the true way, and the true way is 
readier to his mind, by the living prayer of devout seek- 
ing. 

Nor is this all. Our Lord's words have a cumulative 
force, and each previous word blooms out in its successor. 
He that asks, receives light to begin his seeking ; he that 
seeks, finds the path leading to some gate of heaven ; he 
that knocks, shall see the gate opening to him. 

How often we meet with some barrier that crosses our 
path and baffles our progress. Every study and enterprise 
is full of such obstacles, and he that has pursued any far- 



god's blessing on the journey. 77 

reaching plan, has been stopped by some closed gate-way. 
The path of the Christian, that noblest study and enter- 
prise, meets such a barrier in every great stage of his jour- 
ney. He finds intellectual difficulties that he cannot solve, 
trials that he cannot clear up, aspirations that are marked 
by reality. He needs not merely to go onward, but to go 
inward, and learn for himself the truth and peace within 
the kingdom. What shall open the door ? We will not 
condemn reading, or study, or meditation, as means of 
clearing up the great mysteries of our being ; we will not 
jest at the pretensions of the powerful priesthood that has 
claimed to hold the mystical keys, and promise the light 
of heaven to those who seek it in obedience. But above 
all there rises the office of a life, true, earnest, trusting, in 
word, in thought, and work, relying upon God, and craving 
his blessing. Such life is a constant prayer, and knocks 
not vainly at heaven's gate, even while on earth. 

Its power is twofold — upon man and upon God. It 
acts upon man, by opening within his soul the faculties 
that make him most receptive of heavenly influence — upon 
the reason whose eye yearns for the eternal light, upon the 
conscience and affections which crave the infinite rectitude 
and love. What, in fact, is the noblest intellectual act, 
but an opening of the mind to divine things ? Intuition, 
what is it but seeing into the divine verity, and what nur 
tures the power so well as devout faith and striving ? He 
of the disciples had most of it, who had most love, for he 
tfho leaned upon the Master's bosom, spake most raptur- 
ously of the heavenly glory in Him revealed. 



78 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Opening thus the soul of man to the divine kingdom, 
the devout life, as it stands striving at the gate, opens the 
divine kingdom also to the soul. The two influences com- 
bine in one, even as in the expanding lily, the bursting bud 
and the descending sunshine work together in opening the 
flower to heaven, and heaven to the flower. It is certainly 
true that we are surrounded by an unseen realm of spirit- 
ual reality, and that it is opened to us only as we grow into 
it. There are discrete degrees, or degrees of quality, and 
concrete degrees, or degrees of quantity, said one of the 
greatest of spiritual philosophers. We open concrete de- 
grees, simply by advancing — we open discrete degrees by 
rising, and can enter a new quality of being, only by living 
up to it. This is the law of the opening of heaven to man. 
When we stand at the gate, yearning for a clearer sense 
of God's love, craving clearer light on prevailing evil, 
yearning for a solution of the dark problem that most per- 
plexes mind and heart, desolate under some bereavement, 
crazed by some doubt; let there be no despair if the gate 
seems closed upon us, and we knock in vain. It shall not 
be always in vain. If seeking and asking prevail not, let 
lowly persevering obedience, that prayer without ceasing, 
strive at the gate, and some good angel will appear, and 
he door will be opened, and light will break through. 
Every enigma will not, indeed, at once be solved, and door 
beyond door may appear unopened before us. Yet enough 
of the heavenly kingdom will be opened to cheer away 
despondency, and to confirm faith and hope 



god's blessing on the journey. " 79 

We end our meditation as we begun. Life is a con- 
stant want, and should be a constant prayer. Continuing 
in every word and way and work, lifting man to Grod, and 
winning Grod to man. 

Thus let the great journey begin, and thus let it go 
on. Thus beginning, it will give youth noble aim and 
needed power, without chilling its generous fervor or tak- 
ing away a single pure joy. Thus continuing, it will lead 
manhood to an experience better than the much knowledge 
with much sorrow which constitutes worldly wisdom, and 
will secure to age a peace deepening as futurity draws 
near. 

Raise, then, the great life-prayer. "With all our asking, 
above the vast host of eager desires and clamorous pas- 
sions, let the heart ask God for the best gift, that conse- 
crates every other — even the wisdom from above. With 
all our seeking, above and within the numberless paths 
that life reveals, seek the way that does not deceive. 
Through all startling changes and dazzling opportunities, 
gates of knowledge and power, look most earnestly to the 
gate that opens heavenly influence, and let progress be a 
growing revelation. Life itself then becomes prayer. 
Rooted and grounded in love, the deeper its humility, the 
higher its joy. The asking, thirsty roots of its being, send 
up vigor to the branches that wave in the light of heaven. 
Each birthday will then be more peaceful than the pre- 
vious, and however encompassed with clouds and darkness, 
the eye of faith cannot be cheerless. 



80 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

" Lead, Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom, 

Lead Thou me on ! 
The night is dark, and I am far from home — 

Lead Thou me on I 
Keep Thou my feet ; I do not ask to see 
The distant scene, — one step enough for me. 

" So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still 

Will lead me on 
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till 

The night is gone : 
And with the morn those angel faces smile 
Which I have loved long since and lost awhile." 



IL 



" A coira is man in a small letter, yet the best copy of Adam, before he tasted 
of Eve, or tne Apple ; and he is happy whose small practice in the world can only 
write his character. His soul is as yet a white paper unscribbled with observa- 
tions of the world, wherewith, at length, it becomes a blurred note-book. He is 
purely happy because he knows no evil, nor hath made means by sin to be ac- 
quainted with misery. He arrives not at the mischief of being wise, nor endures 
evils to come by foreseeing them. He kisses and loves all, and when the smart 
of the rod is past, smiles on the beater. The older he grows he is a stair lower 
from God. He is the Christian's example and the old man's relapse ; the one im- 
itates his pureness and the other falls into his simplicity. Could he put off his 
body with his little coat, he had got eternity without a burden, and exchanged 
but one heaven for another. 



CHILDHOOD. 

Our childhood, instead of being a passing stage, is a 
permanent experience of our life, and gains interest with 
years. Before we know it, we flit by this first Mile Stone 
of our journey ; yet we are always looking back to it, and 
never without seeing fresh flowers blooming among the 
mosses of its time-worn surface. Because St. Paul said, 
" When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as 
a child, I thought as a child : but when I became a man, 
I put away childish things ; " he is generally regarded as 
disparaging the mind of childhood, in order to honor the 
superior wisdom of manhood. But a single glance at the 
connection will show the error of this view. St. Paul, in 
the maturity of his powers and the fulness of his expe- 
rience, is declaring the peerless worth of love as the light 
of the earth and the foretaste of heaven. Looking for- 
ward to the glories of that blessed state where this spirit 
shall have full life, and see God no longer through a mir- 
ror darkly, but face to face ; he speaks of his present power 
of mind as preliminary to that full vision, even as child- 



84 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

hood in its simplicity is preliminary to manhood in its ex- 
perience. Childhood, therefore, in its way, is just as hon- 
orable as manhood in its way, and each has a worth not 
only in itself, but also as a step to something higher. In 
this spirit, let us now look upon childhood and consider 
what it is, how it should be treated whilst it lasts, and 
how prepared for the time when it ceases and graver cares 
come. This paper will be one of a series, running at in- 
tervals through the volume, on the Circle of Human Life, 
or the Ages of Man interpreted by the Gospel. 

The Nature of childhood, what is it ? It is simply 
itself, and not any thing else. The child is not an angel, 
as sentimentalists dream ; not a fiend, as dogmatists have 
declared ; but a mingled and undeveloped creature, a man 
ungrown, with all the powers and passions of humanity ex- 
isting, but not brought into consciousness with the natural 
and the spiritual forces in the bud, yet with the natural 
more forward than the spiritual, and needing guidance far 
wiser than its own. 

Whether good or bad, whether well or ill trained, a 
child will be a child, and not man or woman ; for God and 
nature have ordained a law over the mind quite as impe- 
rious as that over the body, and they who try to defy that 
law, find it easier to spoil the child into a foolish precocity 
than to ripen him into premature wisdom. Let the child 
be a child, — speak, think, and judge as such, in all sim- 
plicity. We have no doubt that such was the case with 
St. Paul himself in his early years, so genial and earnest 



CHILDHOOD. 85 

his whole development seems to have been ; and it is gen- 
erally the case, that all truly healthy culture starts from a 
true beginning. 

Regarding the first ten years of life as the period of 
childhood, we remark that the child's traits are chiefly 
these three ; sensuousness, imitation, unconsciousness, or 
impulsiveness. He is sensuous ; we do not say sensual, 
for this word is a libel even upon the earliest years, since 
however much the infant lives in the world of the senses, 
the senses themselves start elevating thoughts, and stir 
beautiful affections in the little creature so dependent upon 
sight and touch for impressions. 

Compare for example the appetite of a child for food 
with the appetite of a gluttonous man. Give a branch of 
red cherries, or a ripe downy peach to that playful, curly- 
headed boy, and the feast is to him a lyric poem in which 
the merriest fancy waits on the revel of his lips. Com- 
pare him, then, with some bloated gourmand over his 
loaded table, and you see all the difference between healthy 
senses, and the low sensuality that makes a god of the 
belly. 

The child is imitative, and very prone to do as others do 
around him. He is unconscious — unconscious of his own 
powers and affections, speaking and acting as the impulse 
moves him, without the trouble of comparing various 
thoughts or reconciling inconsistencies of conduct. Ideas, 
feelings, and purposes come and go like visitations from 
some involuntary source ; so that his mind is as much the 



86 MTLE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

play-ground of its own emotions and associations, as the 
sky is the play-ground of the clouds. 

" Gay hope is theirs, by fancy fed, 
Less pleasing, when possest ; 
The tear forgot as soon as shed, 
The sunshine of the breast." 

For the first five years, this unconsciousness generally 
continues, and it is the office of the second five years of 
childhood to bring the impulses under some self-command, 
and educate the mind to habits of reflection and coherence 
without breaking down its naturalness. 

Such is childhood in its most conspicuous traits ; but 
why try to analyze and define them, when we see the origi- 
nal so clearly before us, and we all know so well the young 
life so busy with the senses, so dependent and imitative, 
so impulsive and spontaneous ? 

The practical question comes, how is this period to be 
treated, or what is the religious nurture of childhood ? 
Our reply is exactly in accordance with its own nature, 
and the nature of religion. Is the child a sensuous, imi- 
tative, impulsive creature ? then bring religion in such a 
way that he can see and feel it, without ceasing to be a 
child, or being spoiled into a little mope or bigot. Does 
he live very much under the influence of his senses, and 
little in the power of abstract ideas ? then make religion a 
plain fact to his senses ; let God's mind be shown in his 
works ; let Christ's mission, character, and deeds, be set 
forth simply and plainly to the perceptions in simple nar- 



CHILDHOOD. 87 

rative and expressive illustrations ; let morality be made 

a specific discipline ; and above all, let the elders of the 

family show clearly in their own temper and manners, that 

religion is something sacred and beautiful, something as 

much a matter of fact as the pleasant sunshine or the 

« 
daily bread. 

Again, is the child imitative, and proving thus by this 
very instinct that he was not made to lead, but to follow, 
and seeming to be looking around him for some standard 
of conduct, as much as to say, "I am not sufficient for 
myself; I cannot go alone; show me what I shall do, 
and I will do it ? " What is plainer than that right habits 
should be clearly set before him, so that imitation may 
lead him in the true paths, and doing as others do, he may 
do what is right. Think of this wisely, and it may put a 
check upon our petulance or worldliness, yet it should not 
interfere with our proper ease or naturalness to know 
what open eyes are watching us. Artificial solemnity, a 
put-on sweetness, or make-believe devotion, will not do, 
and our children will soon find us out in such tricks. Let 
us have a true, reasonable, cheerful reverence and good 
will, and act accordingly in a sensible, consistent way, and 
they will know it, and their ready instinct of imitation 
will win from our heart and manner the grace that they 
need. There is a great deal too much baby-talk and baby- 
acting among elders ; and some people try to make a 
child's toy of religion itself. Away with such folly. In 
all simplicity, but with full heart and wisdom, present 
Christianity before our children as it lives in our own expe- 



88 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

rience ; and while we teach them to say their prayers in 
certain words, teach them also by our own example, by 
making devotion a family habit, in which each child who 
can read a sentence shall take an active part, and so be one 
of God's children with us. The main point at issue is 
not the imitating a certain manner, but the catching a cer- 
tain spirit, and be assured that there is no conviction so 
deep, no aspiration so tender, that something of its 
power may not reach and nurture the unreflective and im- 
pulsive creature so susceptible of every magnetic im- 
pression. 

Is there not also a way of presenting religion to the 
child, as being an impulsive as well as a sensuous and imi- 
tative creature ? A being so subject to moods of wilful- 
ness, may be won to visitations of a gentle spirit, and the 
expulsive power of a new affection may put away the evil 
impulse that for the time has mastered the heart. Think 
of this fact seriously ; remember how often we ourselves, 
with all our reflection and self-control, are possessed, ap- 
parently, without our own will, by some dismal fancy or 
petulant humor, and we fight against it in vain, until some- 
thing occurs to change the scene and the mood ; and then 
make charitable allowance for the wayward impulses of 
childhood. Instead of fighting against the evil spirit in 
something of its own obstinacy, try to touch another chord, 
to overcome evil with good, and charm away the dark visi- 
tant, as David's harp charmed away the gloom of the 
moody Saul. Great is the power of a genial, dignified re- 
ligious temper, in working thus upon the impulsive nature 



CHILDHOOD. 89 

of the child, and winning a wayward humor to reason and 
good will. 

To reason — can a child be expected to be reasonable ? 
Yes, eminently so, but not to enter into abstract reasoning. 
He is reasonable who has a sense of what is right or 
proper, whether he can define or explain it or not ; whilst 
he is a reasoner, who can state the grounds of his convic- 
tion in connected, logical propositions. According to this 
definition, the child can be reasonable without being a 
reasoner, nay, from the very dormancy of the logical fac- 
ulty, he seems gifted often with a singular insight into char- 
acter and conduct. Put a case of action clearly before an 
unsophisticated child, and you will find yourself frequently 
amazed by the sense of right, the keen intuitive judgment 
of the little umpire. You will find your own motives seen 
into in the same way by young critics who have never 
taken lessons of Lavater or Spurzheim. Let this faculty of 
insight be sacredly cherished ; and instead of perplexing 
the brain with abstract propositions or dry deductions, 
let the facts of life, whether religion, history, or nature, be 
brought before the child, and the reason will strengthen 
its intuition long before the time for reasoning has come. 
Our Saviour understood this well; and when he called 
young children to him and blessed them, he left with them 
an impression of himself stronger than any argument, — an 
impression upon their reason in its quick insight long be- 
fore they could reason upon his words. Let us all do like- 
wise, and present the facts of life before the abstractions 



90 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

of philosophy to the young mind, and so we train it to the 
best philosophy at last. 

Thus we believe in making a religion a fact to child- 
hood, alike in view of its being sensuous, imitative, and 
spontaneous. 

But the Future, the training for the cares to come, 
what shall we say of this ? Who can help thinking of 
this, when we look thoughtfully upon children at their play, 
in the mood of the poet, as he returned to the old school- 
house, about which a new generation was gamboling : — 

Alas, regardless of their doom, 

The little victims play ! 
No sense have they of ills to come, 

Nor care beyond to-day. 
Yet see how all around them wait 
The ministers of human fate, 
And black misfortune's baleful train. 

Shall we sadden them with constant homilies, on care, and 
pain, and disappointment, and vice, and crime, and sin, 
and death, and hell ? No, not so ; but deal with the soul 
as Grod would have us deal with the body — preoccupy it 
with what is good and true, and useful, so shall it best con- 
tend against the world's trials, when they come. Begin 
from the first with recognizing the child as a religious 
being, a subject of the divine government, and to be brought 
up in its truths and affections. Take this stand, and your 
whole course of nurture is a preparation of the child for 
maturity. You will preoccupy the mind with a genial, 



CHILDHOOD. 



pure and reverent, liberal Christianity, just as you try U 
preoccupy the veins with wholesome blood, and the lungs 
with wholesome air. The same method will enable you 
to meet speculative questions which are sometimes started 
by children, and which cannot be answered by any reason- 
ing simple enough for their apprehension. Preoccupy 
them with a just faith in GJ-od, in Christ and immortality, 
and their reason will have a due sense of those august 
truths long before they can reason them out. That judi- 
cious writer on Home Education, Isaac Taylor, remarks 
that each season of life is preceded by a period of thought- 
fulness, when the mind, in spite of its follies and pas- 
sions, " tries its strength upon those insoluble problems 
which sages have so often professed to have disposed of, 
but which still continue to torment human reason, even 
from its earliest dawn. There are indications sometimes 
of a crisis of this sort in the fifth year ; still more decisive- 
ly in the tenth or eleventh ; and again in the eighteenth. 
It is at these moments that the soul comes to a stand, for 
an instant, and asks, whither am I going ? " 

Let such states of perplexity be met by whatever ar- 
guments or illustrations may serve ; but in childhood, 
surely the best answer is the positive truth set forth in the 
life or in words that carry life with them, the life of faith 
and love. The verses or hymns that breathe the spirit 
of filial trust, Christian affection, persevering obedience, 
heavenly hope, will carry the perplexed soul through such 
a time of misgiving better far than Paley's Evidences or 
Butler's Analogy, or all the abstract metaphysics ever 



92 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

written, and admirable enough in their way. We believe 
much in this power of verse to preoccupy the mind with 
truth ; and in doing it, we follow the hint of Providence 
and fall in with the child's ready instinct for rhythm. The 
spring-time of life, like that of nature, may fitly begin in 
song, and musical words with a loving spirit fitly ushers 
the child into a sense of the meaning of that moral king- 
dom, which the graver seasons of life are to develop by so 
many labors and trials. 

With all due sense of the infirmity and exposures of our 
nature, nurture the child within the divine kingdom, and 
preoccupy his mind with right impressions. Then child- 
hood shall be happy and reasonable, cheerful and reverent. 
If the future on earth is denied, kind heaven will continue 
the discipline in another world, and the memory left here 
below will of itself be a blessed hope. Full is this bloom- 
ing earth of the graves of children ; and as it rolls through 
the blue ether, with the din of its passions and the hum of 
its business, and the song of its joy, there rises to the ear 
of Heaven the plaintive cry of bereaved parents more con- 
stant than the drum-beat of martial empire. Let that 
plaintive cry lose its anguish and not lose its depth by the 
comfort of a heavenly faith, and let us write on the sod 
where you plant the violets of remembrance, words like 



Here rests one of few years and few sorrows. 
Living he did God's work, and dying does it still? 
Living, he opened new springs of love on earth, 
Dying, he wins new hearts to Christ and heaven. 



CHILDHOOD. 93 

The dust is not the saddest grave of childhood, but its 
saddest grave is the heart that outlives its own early days 
only to renounce their childlike spirit, and bury their inno- 
cence in a living sepulchre. beware of this ! and by a 
true, progressive life, let the child's heart still beat on in 
the bosom of the man. Forsake nothing that has- been 
simple, confiding, loving. Take one of the ruddy apples 
which the exuberant harvest gives, divide it, and see in its 
core the very mark of the blossom in which, last spring, it 
began. Think of this, and in the core of your mature being, 
cherish the blossom of your own spring-time, and enter the 
kingdom of heaven like a little child. This was in the 
apostle's thought, when looking forward from his present 
reasoning, believing, yet somewhat darkling estate, he con- 
templated the great transformation that should complete 
his progressive being, and bring out his early intuitions 
and mature questionings into the fulness of the heaven- 
ly vision, where, no longer seeing through a mirror dark- 
ly, he should see face to face in the spirit and the pres- 
ence of that love which is the end of all faith and hope. 

Into that presence, Father in Heaven, lead us with 
joy and with trembling. More and more, as earthly 
guardians fall and earthly homes are broken, we need 
the love that is eternal, and the mansions that do not 
decay. 



m. 



f \t Sang t\ti tuber fins. 



O human heart ! thou hast a song 
For all that to the earth belong, 
Whene'er the g^>J<W chain of love 
Hath linked the*> #» the heaven above. 

<» human heart 1 what deed of thine 
•oeld gib* i kingdom so divine? 
O human heart 1 that singest still 
Through chastening good, misreckoned ill. 

8. F. Adams. 



THE SONG THAT NEVEB TIKES. 

We are all of us at some time singers, and however dull 
our ear or poor our voice, we cannot help singing forth, in 
some way, the feeling that is in us. Perhaps one of the 
best proofs that the instinct of song lies in our very nature, 
is in the fact, that many who have no music for others, 
have enough of it for themselves, and the sweet voice 
within the heart itself disguises to them the discord of 
their lips. Most of the chief Mile Stones of our life-jour- 
ney are passed with a song. We go through our infancy 
to the sound of nursery rhymes, and as we enter the grave, 
faith sings her requiem over our dust. The workman 
cheers his task with some stirring strain, and the marriage 
feast is not complete until some song or hymn consecrates 
the union by the harmony of voices. 

This season at which we are now writing, has surely 

been a time of singing with us, in our great city ; and in 

more ways than one, our people have kept up the festive 

tone which the old Church in some manner sanctions, wil- 

5 



98 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

ling to prolong the carols of Christmas into the very 
threshold of the Lenten Fast, and make her children the 
more ready to go into the shade, from satiety of the 
world's garish light. The glee of the Carnival, in some 
measure, reaches through the earth, and few persons are 
there so sad or so secluded, as to have no cheerful notes 
ringing in their ears. I would carry out the remarks upon 
childhood by illustrating the Christian element in song, not 
as a passing sound, but as a permanent force. In other 
words, I would speak of true life as a continuous song, 
alike in its spirit, form, and object. 

sing unto the Lord a new song, said the Psalmist. 
We repeat the words, and trace them up to the true spirit 
of the divine kingdom. The lyric sentiment that breathes 
itself out in music, is but one of the forms of that univer- 
sal fact of inspiration that pervades all nature, and culmi- 
nates in the human soul. We are not speaking now of that 
supernatural inspiration peculiar to the great prophets of 
the human race, but of the gift within the usual order of 
Providence. Every creature, in the measure of its facul- 
ties, was made to be moved by a spirit greater than itself. 
The insect of a day, nutters out its brief span in a glow 
f animal spirits passing its own power ; bird and beast, 
in their larger care and forethought, obey an instinct high 
er than their knowledge ; and man, made in his Maker's 
image, is called to keep his soul ever open to the heavenly 
breath that created him. Man in all ages, and under all 
manners, customs, and creeds, is the most inspired of be- 



THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES. 99 

ings, and feels most deeply the movings of a force within 
him, but not of him. This force makes him rejoice in 
lyrical sounds and actions, in songs and hymns, festive 
dances, warlike marches, and every form of music and 
eloquence. The Old Dispensation is full of it, and the 
stern lawgiver himself, more than once poured forth his 
devotion in a solemn song, and strung first the mighty harp 
which the Psalmist so perfected. What shall we do with 
this element under the Christian dispensation ? Shut it 
up, as some try to do, within its ancient channels, and 
allow it to move only in the words of the old Hebrew 
Psalms ? Or shall we put it under ban altogether, as 
others try to do, and aim to reduce man to a calculating 
machine, or a logic mill, without enthusiasm, without po- 
etry or song ? 

Not so ; but we will do with the lyrical element in our 
nature, with the faculty most open to inspiration, just what 
the Psalmist indicates and God himself decrees. Cherish 
it most sacredly, and make it animate the whole domain 
of life, instead of inditing a few hymns or framing choral 
dances. The new song was to show forth salvation from 
day to day, and thus be a daily spirit instead of an evanes- 
cent word. In the Grospel, the same idea is constantly re- 
cognized. Jesus came to incarnate the Word that breathed 
into nature all its harmonies, and the New Testament ends 
with the new song of the redeemed around the eternal 
throne. The gospel begins with the song of the angels at 
the birth of Christ, and calls on all men to live lives in 
harmony with that heavenly strain. It opens to us at once 



100 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

the heights of the divine kingdom, and bids us open the 
deeps of our own being to its promised spirit. It concerned 
itself less with nicely chosen words, and balanced verse, 
and cunning instruments, because it worked in a mightier 
material, and subdued men themselves into its mouthpieces 
and instruments, until life itself began to move to the 
hymn of heavenly love. It is an essential fact of Chris- 
tianity, that it calls upon men to receive the divine spirit, 
as breathed from the Father through the life of the Mes- 
siah, and regards them as truly living, or fully born, only 
when they are possessed by this spirit, and are thus not 
their own, but Grod's. 

This idea is, indeed, capable of being perverted" into 
the wildest fanaticism, and of making people rave like 
madmen in the name of religion. But to deny it, is worse 
than to pervert it, and the soberest practical obedience is 
its most consistent declaration. What does it mean but 
simply this, that, under the Christian dispensation, we are 
to start with a filial spirit that shall run freely and faith- 
fully through the whole of life, and breathe a cheerful 
loyalty through all its thoughts, desires, and labors. Look 
to every word of our Saviour's, look to the words and deeds 
of every follower true to his kingdom, and we are at littl 
loss to understand how the Gospel interpreted the Psalm, 
and the new song declared the true salvation from day to 
day. A true life is the new song, for from beginning 
to end it is moved by the Spirit, and so follows a divine 
inspiration. 



THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES. 101 

Starting from such a source, the new song must take 
its appropriate form, and through all its changes of tones 
and times, it must not lose sight of its inspiring theme. 
In all variety, it must keep its essential unity, and in 
cheerful faith and good will move onward still in the march 
of life. The exact form of our experience, we cannot con- 
trol, any more than we can control our stature, our talents 
or our skies. Every man has an air of his own, and must 
expect to keep its characteristic in whatever he does, how- 
ever good or bad in his purposes, well or ill disciplined in 
his habits. It is in his own way that he is called to serve 
God, and in his own way take his part in the psalm of life. 
True principle and true discipline, instead of crushing his 
individuality, will bring it out, and so make him more 
truly himself, in reconciling him with Grod. 

We cannot expect to change our temperament or our 
circumstances at will, but we may rule our tempers, and 
use our circumstances, so as to conform our lives to the 
right spirit, and bear a true purpose to the end. "We can- 
not say to what heights or depths of experience we shall 
be called by the allotments of Providence, but we may in 
good measure say how we shall receive what comes to us, 
may never be giddy when on the high places of joy, and 
never despair when down in the deeps of sorrow. The new 
song, which the Divine Comforter inspires, keeps the same 
essential spirit throughout all these variations. From the 
same inspiration comes the Jubilate and the De Profundis, 
keeping humility in gladness, and trust in affliction : 



102 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

O come, let us sing unto the Lord, 

Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation, 

as in that other strain : 

Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, Lord ! 
Lord, hear my voice ; let thine ear be attentive to the voice of 
my supplications. 

Marvellously the life of Jesus keeps the essential unity, 
and the same love that said, " Now is the Son of Man 
glorified, and Glod is glorified in him," also said, " if it be 
possible, let this cup pass from me," and " Father, into thy 
hands I commend my spirit." Such perfect consistency we 
may not expect, but surely we gain in peace and wisdom 
as we approach it, and through all the changes of our 
many-toned life, whether festive or mournful, keep the 
same theme, and rule our spirits in the same heart of faith 
and love. 

What times we shall fall upon, it is not for us to de- 
cide ; but it depends upon us in a great measure how we 
shall time our plans and steps to events as they come. 
Without such timing, feeble and broken is the psalm of 
life — far indeed from the new song that declares salvatio 
from day to day. Too hurried sometimes in our fever of 
impatience, too sluggish sometimes in our easy indolence, 
we go from one extreme to another, and, exhausted by 
foolish haste, we sink into imbecile torpor. Wiser and 
happier is he who keeps a healthy pulse through all vicis- 



THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES. 103 

situdes, and has a time for every thing, and every thing in 
its time. Then a true method regulates the countless 
cares and labors of our lot. Then a round of habits, or- 
derly, but not slavish, free, yet not capricious, wins life 
into its cycles, and hours, days, months, years, move on 
recurrent yet progressive, like the verses of a hymn which 
keep their appointed measure, yet swell as they continue, 
and concentrate force as they advance. Happy the man 
whose life, thus timed and toned, chants from day to day 
the new song of faith and love. 

He draws ever nearer the true object of life, and har- 
monizes all his powers and opportunities into conformity 
with his master purpose. This is the crown of all, the 
hardest and noblest task, to subdue into practical harmony 
the various and conflicting elements of our condition.. 
Most thoughtful men have the idea, and all earnest men 
have the aspiration, but only the thoroughly devoted make 
the realization of a true spiritual order in the whole 
method of life. In youth certainly we often dream of 
maintaining a noble ideal above jarring passions and base 
expedients. But the world is apt to be too strong for our 
aspiration, and finds in our own hearts too ready allies of 
its devices. Then we give in to the prevailing follies, re- 
new our ideal only in romances or reverie, and allow life 
to be as vulgar and prosaic as our visions are proved to be 
impracticable. But no man can substantiate any claim to 
true culture, much less to Christian fidelity, who is willing 
thus to give up his fairest hope and blind himself to his 



104 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

bright star, because so many bewildering meteors flash 
along his path. The true man walks still by its bright- 
ness, until the illusions disappear ; — he keeps up the just 
tone of his spirit, and gradually subdues all discords into 
peace. 

Is the discord in himself or in his circumstances, he 
does not despair of abating it. Is it in himself ? What 
man, who has ever aspired to wisdom and self-command, 
has not found himself challenged by some rebel within the 
camp, who says, " I defy you, imperious conscience or 
master will, and if all others agree, I will not ? " What 
man, who has ever won wisdom and self-command, has not 
met the challenge bravely, and made of the very rebel a 
submissive servant — yes, made anger the spur of justice, 
pride the ally of self-respect, and even indolence the helper 
of just tranquillity. Let each man have a keen eye on 
the rebel passion or habit in himself, that makes the rudest 
jar against the harmony of his life, and not be content 
until the rebel is trained into the general order and swells 
the general strain. 

They that may triumph tolerably well in such self-dis- 
cipline, may complain of the sad discord between their 
mind and their circumstances, and live in a continual war- 
fare of the desire against the deed, the wish against the 
opportunity. Here is the grief of the noblest souls, an 
ideal which no reality equals, and which common life in- 
sults. Each heart shares the bitterness in its own way- 
complains of stinted fortune, or uncongenial society, or ill 
requited kindness, or limited education — complains of 



THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES. 105 

some special disappointment that leaves a dark mark upon 
the memory, or of some abiding grief that clouds and mars 
the whole course of years. Let every man look well to the 
chief point of incongruity between his lot and his wishes, 
and strive to bring it into harmony with his master pur- 
pose ; he will find himself surprised at the triumph in store 
for him, if he perseveres. Let him try to subdue the re- 
fractory circumstance to his own mind, and the effort can- 
not be utterly vain ; let him, in respect to whatever incon- 
gruity is inevitable between his wish and his lot, try to 
subdue his mind to his circumstance, and a deeper peace, 
a diviner harmony may spring from the victory. The com- 
mon people whom he befriends may school him into better 
feelings than any fellowship of wits ; — the drudging labors 
that he performs cheerfully may develope nobler energies 
than any dainty leisure ; — the sacrifices that he bears pa- 
tiently may nurture within him purer affections than the 
rarest ministry of the beautiful arts ; — a brave purpose 
amidst the difficulties of his position, may do more to con- 
solidate his character than a library of ethical abstrac- 
tions; — fidelity constant and judicious in the trials of his 
business, or the griefs of his family, may reveal more moral 
beauty than Italy can unfold, and tell him more of the 
divine kingdom than any oratory can convey. Not at 
once, but at last, a true heart will subdue all things to 
itself, bring all jarring elements into the general harmony, 
and make every faculty and every circumstance join its 
voice in chanting the new song to the Lord. 
5* 



106 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

Thus we meditate upon the new song or a life inspired 
by Grod's love, expressing itself in melodious form, and 
harmonizing all powers and opportunities into conformity 
with its aim. Is this too much to ask of us in this per 
plexed, working- day world, where we are beset with sc 
many cares and temptations that threaten our temper, and 
break our time, and divide our thought ? No man surely 
will be willing to state the opposite, and say that there is 
nothing lyrical in life, and the new song is for angels, and 
not at all for this world. The most practical men best 
exemplify our meaning, for they start with the most cheer- 
ful purpose, and bring all their faculties and chances into 
harmony with their aim. By all work that is earnest, 
and all prayer that is fervent, the end is sought, and 
every genuine life passes into deeper concord as it ad- 
vances. 

When you work, man, sing the new song of heaven- 
ly love, and make your work lighter and stronger for the 
strain. Take labor as the allotment of divine mercy, and 
use its discipline in such a way as to work out your pow- 
ers into just play, and your opportunities into just order. 
It is G-od's method of our discipline, and every man is a 
crude discordant creature, until he sets himself to a wor- 
thy task, and works himself into true shape and temper. 
Toil on cheerfully, and the cares that once threatened to 
make you slave shall make you master, and they shall 
sing to you of your triumphs, instead of groaning to you 
of their exactions. Your work shall open to you God's 
purpose in your being, and help you in your prayers. 



THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES. 107 

Life has its crowning joy, when most pervaded by the 
sense of God's presence and grace — when daily experience 
chimes best with hymn and prayer. We sing the new song 
most blessedly when we yield up our wills to the Divine will, 
and the Infinite Mind guides us, the Eternal Word moves 
us. how poor all our definitions are, when compared 
with the least personal experience of the Divine life within. 
What is the rhythmic joy of all nature, but the varied ex- 
pression of the Creator Spirit, the uncreated Word that is 
ever speaking from God and of God. There is rhythm or 
song throughout the universe — in the recurrent order of 
the seasons — the cycles of the stars — the beat of the 
pulse — the step of the feet — the surging of the seas — the 
undulation of light and sound, as well as in the music of 
measured verse and song. Man can do nothing without 
touching upon this great law of creation ; and the recur- 
rent roll or dash of the most utilitarian machinery, the 
march of the most prosaic procession, combines with epic 
and psalm to illustrate the recurrent and progressive order 
which God has sanctioned throughout his universe. If the 
lowest creatures so feel the impress of this harmony, what 
must that mind be from whom it comes, and of whose infi- 
nite peace and blessed order, our holiest experience, our 
most rapturous joy, gives but a faint reflection. If God's 
words spoken in his works, spoken in the Scriptures of 
revelation, and in a measure in every writing of true wis- 
dom and eloquence, have such inspiration, beauty, harmo- 
ny — what must the Word itself be, the original of all that 
is loveliest in sound, or feeling, or thought. Glory in the 



108 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

Highest, that the Word has been so clothed in humanity 
and dwelt among us. Behold and reflect its glory, and 
with heart and life sing the new song : 

"Worthy is the lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, 
and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing. 

Blessing, arid honor, and glory, and power be unto Him that 
sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever. 

Let the hymns that are taught to happy childhood be 
imbued with this strain ; and let youth, manhood, and age, 
swell its volume by tbeir greater compass, whilst they 
must deepen its tone by their deeper and sometimes darker 
experience. 



IV. 

Bratft. 



O Life ! how pleasant is thy morning, 
Young Fancy's lays the hills adorning ! 
Cold-pausing Caution's lesson scorning, 

"We frisk away, 
Like school-boys at th' expected warning, 

To joy and play. 
Wo wander here, we wander there, 
"We eye the Eose upon the brier, 
Unmindful that the Thorn is near, 

Among the leaves. 

Buens. 

Straight forward goes 
The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path 
Cf the cannon ball. Direct it flies and rapid, 
Shattering that it may reach and shattering what it reachea 
My son I the road the human being travels, 
That on which BLESSING comes and goes, doth follow 
The river's course, the valley's playful windings, 
Curves round the cornfield and the hill of vines, 
Honoring the holy bounds of property ! 
And thus secure, though late, leads to its end. 

SCHILLEB. 



YOUTH. 

The philosophy that ha* come from thrones is a sad one, 
and savors far more of th6 school of Heraclitus the weeper 
than of Democritus the laugher. They who have every 
luxury to satiety, and every honor to weariness, to whom 
fortune can add little happiness, and to whom disappoint- 
ment seems very treason, have not generally had very 
cheerful lives, and the ascetic confessors of crowned heads, 
have not found much reason to call the story whispered by 
royal lips, any happier, to say the least, than that which 
has been said with more trembling by the untitled or the 
poor. Ecclesiastes, the preacher, in order to give point to 
his book on the vanity of the world, takes his stand in the 
palace, builds his pulpit upon the throne, and in the name 
of Solomon, the most magnificent of kings, discourses of 
the follies of mankind. Yet, in every point, he redeems 
satire from skepticism, and uses folly as a foil to show bet- 
ter the worth of heavenly wisdom. In the closing chapter, 



112 MILE STONES IN OUB. LIFE-JOURNEY. 

as he thinks of the happiness of youth, he quits the vein 
of satire altogether, the cynic becomes not a little of an 
enthusiast, and he bids the young enjoy themselves to the 
full, only remembering to temper their joy with devout 
judgment, as in their Creator's presence. 

Here, then, is our subject, so cheerful, yet from the 
saddest book in the Bible. Youth: — 

Its rejoicing in privileges. 

Its remembering of responsibilities. 

Its rejoicing. Rejoice, young man, in thy youth. 
Why ? For many reasons that can be specified, as well as 
for the reason that need not be specified, the reason, that 
youth cannot well help rejoicing, and the young man's 
heart cheers him because it is young — full of fresh life 
and overflowing spirits. It was said by Rousseau, that the 
period between the twelfth and the seventeenth year is the 
only time when man is absolutely happy ; inasmuch as it 
is then only, that his forces of body and mind much ex- 
ceed his desires. Surely, at this season, or perhaps during 
the whole time from ten to twenty, there is more power on 
hand, in proportion to the demands made upon it, than at 
any other time. 

But even this exuberant strength must have a serious 
meaning, and its spontaneous joy is intended to be the 
germinating time of great purposes. Rejoice, then, 
young man, in the days of thy youth, and let thy heart, in 
its glad fulness, cheer thee, yet remember that all power 



YOUTH. 113 

brings responsibility, and even for this joy, God will call 
thee to judgment. 

Without dividing these remarks into two separate sec- 
tions, I will follow the two lines of thought through the 
chief spheres of youthful experience, and show how it is, 
that responsibility walks hand in hand with privilege. 

Among the foremost pleasures of youth, stands the grow- 
ing consciousness of personal liberty. Each year, after 
the dependence of childhood ceases, some new drops are' 
poured into the thrilling cup of conscious freedom. The 
feeling with which the man throws his first vote or first 
signs his name to an agreement in his own right, is as no- 
thing compared with the feeling with which the boy first 
roams the street unattended, or ranges the country with 
his horse, or gun, or fishing-rod. This sense of liberty 
brings out a great and noble instinct, which God has put 
into the soul. Rejoice in it, young man, and let thy 
heart cheer thee with the high sentiment of freedom, which 
has made nations great, and genius noble. But remember 
that fearful danger lurks in thy very joy, and that God 
holds thee responsible for the use of thy liberty. You 
are no longer to be led by the hand of your parents, and 
are therefore called to take hold of the hand of God. You 
no longer depend implicitly upon the will of men, and are 
therefore prepared to lean upon that will, subjection to 
which, is the only freedom. Your liberty will become 
miserable wilfulness, unless it follows law, even the true 
law of life, as declared in nature and by the Gospel. 



114 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

Learn this truth early, the earlier the better. When you 
are tempted by your own impulses, or unprincipled com- 
panions, to mistake self-indulgence for dignity, or wilful- 
ness for manhood, remember that you enslave yourself in 
the very delusion of your boasted liberty, like the poor sot 
who is dreaming of grasping a sceptre, while he drains the 
cup that is to drag him down to the dust. Yes, it is true 
— all emancipation from outward restraint becomes new 
servitude, unless it is made the occasion of higher alle- 
giance. The body, emancipated from leading-strings, is 
lost, unless its freed limbs move in harmony with its own 
laws, and the laws of the universe. The mind, too, is lost 
unless it finds a higher authority than that which it puts 
off with the dress of childhood, and learns self-government 
with its independence. 

Youth is the time to think seriously, religiously, of 
this great truth, and exalt and strengthen its conscious 
liberty, into the confidence of faith, and the steadfastness 
of law. Sadly it forgets this, and homes without number 
are made wretched, because young men mistake license for 
freedom, and make utter shipwreck of themselves by 
launching wildly upon the great sea of life, without com- 
pass or pilot, at the very time when God and conscience 
call them to choose the sufficient guide. Happy — happy 
the youth who makes so little of this mistake, that he can 
correct it, and taught wisdom by a sip of folly, learns that 
the best liberty, is the truest obedience and the most reve- 
rent conscientiousness. Rejoice, then, in thy conscious 
freedom, young man, and let thy heart cheer thee, and 



YOUTH. 115 

walk in the ways of thine heart, and the sight of thine 
eyes, but remember that God will bring thee to judgment 
for this, and his sentence will not fail to arrest you, if you 
make liberty license instead of law. 

< Another of the peculiar pleasures of youth lies in the 
sense of growing power. Childhood is hardly conscious 
of its own energies, and the mind works with a certain 
spontaneousness that takes as little thought of itself, as 
the healthy blood takes thought of its own tides. But 
gleams of consciousness ere long come, and at the age of 
eleven or twelve, certainly as early as fourteen, there is 
something like a distinct conviction of the youth's charac- 
teristic powers. The leading tastes, and talents, and dis- 
positions, begin to show themselves with some definiteness, 
and the youth takes vast delight in the consciousness of 
his resources. He perceives, compares, judges, fancies,, 
schemes, and has the feeling, that within his mind, as 
within a tent, lie great forces encamped, and from time to 
time, they are putting on their armor, and each going out 
into the field. This experience is occasion for rejoicing, 
since God has attached to every faculty a peculiar happi- 
ness in its own activity, and as the insects of a day spread 
with joy their gossamer wings to the sunshine, so the soul, 
the immortal Psyche, takes vast delight in pluming and 
trying her pinions for her unending flight. Rejoice, 
young man, then, in the sense of growing power, but re- 
member, sacredly, religiously remember, that for this 
verj privilege God will hold thee to judgment. Regard 



116 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

those powers, not with pride or conceit, but with humility 
and fidelity. Yes, let each faculty, as it rises in the morning 
of its day into distinct consciousness, bow down before its 
Maker and its G-od, and consecrate itself to a true life-ser- 
vice. Without this, power is weakness, and talent is van- 
ity. Remember that every gift brings an obligation, and 
as the gift first opens into consciousness, let it open into 
true service. 

Remember this, young man, or you are nothing. You 
are to be weighed by God and man in the measure of your 
usefulness. No matter who or what you are, or who your 
father is, or who your connections are, or what your wealth 
or poverty may be, whatever your talents or position, the 
main point in your destiny turns upon this question, " Do 
you mean to be useful or do you not — do you mean to serve 
Grod and your time faithfully, and do a good work in the 
world, or do you mean to cumber the ground by a life of 
conceit, selfishness and folly ? " Ho who begins otherwise 
than with a purpose to be faithful, begins wrong, and 
strays worse the farther he goes in that wrong path. Shun 
it, and take the right way. The lives of the strong and 
the great of this world urge upon us this truth. Look to 
the graves of late greenest among the dust of the great in 
both hemispheres. Think of the great captain of our 
mother country, with all his prejudices, so faithful in peace 
and war to his sworn allegiance. Think of him, our own 
great statesman, but a little while ago laid in the grave in 
presence of thousands who thronged that village home, and 
read in the oak and the flowers on his coffin, fit ciphers of the 



YOUTH. 1 17 

strength and beauty of his mind. With all his frailties, 
and it would be strange if a man made on so large a scale 
should not have some, he began life with the idea of service, 
and his youthful aspirations and his maturest thoughts, 
are all stamped with that idea. He grew up with the idea 
that his mind was to be a working force, and the very 
same feeling which beat in his heart when he heard with 
tears his father's promise that he should go to college, 
came out in all the great acts of his life, and gave tone to 
his dying words. If in any acts of his life, he fell from 
this great allegiance, his own conscience became his severest 
judge, and his weakness, as well as his power, teaches the 
majesty of true service. Higher, deeper, than any stand- 
ard of worldly greatness, is the rule of the gospel. The 
Master bids us all measure obligation by privilege, and 
calls on the young to give all their powers to the service 
of the divine kingdom. Rejoice in your power, young 
"man, be it much or little. Remember to use it well — to 
choose religiously and to follow faithfully your worldly 
business or profession, and above and within all other vo- 
cations, keep in mind that we are all called of God in Je- 
sus Christ. 

Once more, and to sum up all, it is one of the pleas 
ures of youth to possess a certain indefinable enthusiasm, 
which gives the character a peculiar charm, and which 
throws over life an unspeakable freshness and delight. Re- 
joice in this — feel the beatings of a young heart, and do 
not for worlds surrender that generous ardor, for a chilling 



118 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

worldly prudence, which is bad enough in an old man, but 
more monstrous than decrepitude itself, in youth. Have 
your enthusiasm, have hearty hopes and warm friendships, 
and be willing to dream some overfond dreams. But remem- 
ber that God holds thee to judgment for this — remember 
that this very exuberance of feeling is the substance from 
which your best affections and principles should be formed, 
the exuberant sap which should shape and mature the 
trunk, and leaf, and fruit of a manly character. To let it 
go out in youthful lusts and unhallowed passions, would 
be like draining the young plant of its juices, to distil 
them into draughts of madness, instead of leaving them 
in their own appointed channels. Be pure, be true, be 
faithful, and your very enthusiasm will harden into strength 
and grow into virtue, and bloom into lasting nobleness. 
Yes, follow God's bidding, and you will find, that as years 
gather over you, and your emotions are less susceptible, 
they lose their impulsiveness without losing their power, 
and the enthusiasm of the youth is consolidated into the 
honor, fidelity, and good-will of the man. 

And this leads us to the main point of our thought, 
the need of making youth a season of direct religious ob- 
ligation. Sad it is, when this susceptible time passes, and 
the affections are not led to God, and the acquiescence 
of childhood in what is taught as religion, is not confirmed, 
by the youth, on his own personal responsibility. It is 
never too late, indeed, to repent and believe, but it is none 
the less certain, that a man cannot^ by subsequent amend- 
ment, ever make up for the loss of early religion, for the- 



YOUTH. 119 

loss of that early fidelity to God, which breathes the fresh 
fervor of young enthusiasm into faith, and twines all the 
pleasant associations of the morning of our days with the 
truths and hopes of Christianity. Think of this, youth, 
think of this, parents, and do not pursue your too fre- 
quent error, of consigning the most formative of all periods 
of our moral life, to the giddiness of the passions and the 
dissipations of the world. The Christian church needs the 
young within its fold, to give it freshness and beauty ; the 
young need the church, to subdue their wilfulness, and to 
nurture their enthusiasm into a heavenly faith and hope. 
Think of this, youth whose eye rests upon this page, and 
deem your education all incomplete, until you have learned 
enough and schooled your feelings enough, to take your 
stand among intelligent believers, and sit in token of your 
settled faith and your avowed need, at the table of commu- 
nion to which the gospel calls you. Think of this, parents, 
and by your example and counsel, establish your children 
in healthful, reasonable, quickening religious convictions, 
and lead the way to the fold of the good shepherd. This 
course is the prevention of all skepticism, by a spirit above 
the power of every denyiDg argument ; it is the cure for 
all disappointment, by the peace and love that cannot dis- 
appoint. 

Seriously, now, and without any straining or preten- 
sion — what good on earth is so great, as a cheerful, large, 
steadfast Christian faith and purpose in youth, establishing 
every blessing by a duty, and exalting every worthy sen- 
timent into a principle? What better security against 



120 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

the chances and changes of the world — what better safe- 
guard of just influence and abiding welfare — what better 
preservative of that which makes youth so fresh and hope- 
ful? 

There is something in youth, that of itself leads us to 
adore the ineffable goodness of that majestic Being, who 
knows no declining years, and whose bliss ever rejuvenates 
itself in blessedness unspeakable. The nearer we approach 
to God, we perpetuate our early joy and breathe the youth 
immortal. Do not the truest men partake somewhat of 
this privilege — the men who, by purity of life, and hearti- 
ness of affection, and fidelity in well-doing, have confirmed 
into principles the best enthusiasm of their early days, 
who have led liberty up to law, and power to allegiance, 
and impulse into conviction ? Have they not about them, 
to their latest years, a freshness and charm that the world 
cannot give ? Do they not carry into the winter of their 
days, the sweet balms of summer flowers ? have they not 
struck in the fairy tints of early fancy ? have they not 
opened, within the breaking cistern of earthly feeling, a 
channel into that living spring whence gush the fountains 
of immortal youth ? 

At best we are a frail generation, yet how much good, 
the good God offers us. The youths shall faint and be 
weary, the young men shall utterly fail, but they that wait 
upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount 
up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, 
they shall walk and not faint. The best philosophy, most 
confirms this blessed faith. 



V. 



What is this that stirs within, 
Loving goodness, hating sin, 
Always craving to be blest, 
Finding here below no rest? 

What is it? and whither? whence i 
This unsleeping, secret sense, 
Longing for its rest and food 
In some hidden untried good ? 

Tis the soul ! Mysterious Name! 
Him it seeks from whom it came ; 
It would, Mighty God, like Thee, 
Holy, holy holy, be 1 

FusNtea. 



THE TRUE FIRE. 

The events that decide a man's destiny are not often those 
which figure most largely in his external experience, and 
are most frequently spoken of by his friends. We all have 
our own secret history, whose honor or shame can he fully 
known only to ourselves. At some point in the great jour- 
ney, whether sooner or later, we meet some one of God's 
messengers who reveals himself to us alone, and our char- 
acter takes its turn for good or evil, according to our re- 
ception of his message. The fire 3till burns that of old 
shone upon Moses in Horeb, and the voice still speaks 
that called to the child Samuel in the temple. 

It was at the most momentous point of his life tha 
this visitation came to the great Jewish lawgiver, as h 
was tending the flock of Jethro in the solitudes of Horeb. 
The Divine presence appeared to him in a bush which 
burned without being consumed, and at once compelled 
him to listen to the voice that spoke, and became to him of 
itself a most expressive symbol of the light of the God 



124 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

speaking. " Yes," this heroic man could say to himself 
as he gazed, " yes, there is a fire that can burn without 
burning out ; my hopes for my name and race are not to 
die away with the youthful heats that mature years have 
now cooled ; my aspirations for some nearer presence of 
God are not always to waver with the lights and shades of 
nature and fortune ; there is a glory uncreated which is 
to be made known ; here it shines upon my poor vision, 
and by this bush, now bright with the heavenly shekinah, 
my faith is fixed, that God will be a burning, abiding light 
to his people, and they are called to be burning, abiding 
lights of his kingdom." 

The passage presents two subjects intimately connected 
and illustrating each other. It affords an emblem of God's 
revelation to man through that Word of nature and Scrip- 
ture, which never fails ; it affords, too, an emblem of man's 
revelation of God through the light of a true life which 
never dies out. Intimately connected the two subjects 
are, for we cannot speak wisely of what God has revealed 
without looking for its marks into the experience of men, 
and we cannot speak wisely of the experience of man with- 
out considering God's work within his soul. We take a 
branch of the second subject, the light in man's own life, 
and treat the first, the light of revelation, only as it may 
be connected with it. We would meditate now upon a 
true life-purpose, or the firo that a man should carry within 
him ever, that he may do his work well, serve his neighbor, 
gave his soul, and show forth the glory of his Creator. 
This true fire burns, but does not burn out ; it lights and 



THE TRUE FIRE. 125 

warms every sphere of life, whilst it is fed from a d.vine 
and unfailing source — unfailing as the immortality of 
which it is the pledge. 

The true fire that burns without wasting away is lighted 
within the soul, when the will of man is brought into just 
contact with the love and truth of God. It is lighted 
whenever a man feels that there is a spirit within him, 
and that this spirit is bound by its own being as well as 
by heaven's law, to live in the divine presence and be 
faithful to the divine kingdom. Then the true life-purpose 
is kindled, and needs no change but progress to give 
healthful glow to every faculty and work of existence. 
This is the proper central fire of a man, having its seat in 
that power of will which gives him his personality, fed by 
all the affections that ally him with his neighbor and his 
God, spreading in all the lines of influence which heavenly 
wisdom decrees. Without something of this fire in him, 
man ceases to be man, and is baser than the grossest sav- 
age who gropes so dimly after God as to bow down to an 
idol in the name of religion, and so misinterprets the law 
of rectitude as to sacrifice his own life to revenge a wrong 
to his brother or kinsman ; for such a savage, after his 
rude fashion, tries to be faithful, and is above the utter in- 
fidel's degradation. With much of this fire in him, man 
draws near the Father, and more approaches that perfect 
Son, who said, " My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," 
and in every thought and feeling served the living God. 

Is this rightly called the true fire, and will it burn 



126 MTLE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

without burning out ? That surely is the true fire which 
best warms and lights the life. What does this better 
than an earnest, faithful purpose, rooted in good will and 
branching into true uses ? Some leading passion may 
seem to give out more heat, and probably superficial ob- 
servers might ascribe to passionate men more fervor than 
to faithful men. But it is by confounding . smoke and 
blaze with vital warmth, like the simple child that sees 
more power in the crackling thorns that his play-fellows 
kindle upon the beach, than in the calm, clear light that 
shines out from the ocean rock, true emblem of a good 
man's deeds, as the former is in Solomon's view fit simili- 
tude of the laughter of a fool. If there be any leading 
passion not governed by a faithful purpose, it consumes 
the man, and makes a victim of its votary. If the leading 
passion be guided by fidelity, then it becomes the intense 
fidelity that so marks the greatest heroes of history, and 
the truest servants of God. In either case, then, the faith- 
ful spirit is the true fire. 

Do any persons have misgivings as to all fervor of 
character, and in their regard for sober, practical judg- 
ment, speak as if all zeal must needs have an element of 
*blly destined ere long to burn out if it burns at all ? How 
great the mistake, for nothing can be more sober and prac- 
tical than an earnest purpose; nothing surely so favors 
healthy life as the active force that gives mind and body 
its vital glow. It is better far for a man to live the full 
life of his nature, with every faculty awake to its own 
office in its own time, than to doze existence away in the^ 



THE TRUE FIRE. 127 

sluggard's torpor, or the worldling's coldness of heart. The 
natural life needs glow for its own vigor and permanence. 
The spiritual life follows the same law, and its vigor is as 
abiding as its fire is bright and full. Errors there may be, 
indeed, on each side ; and if some men are so sluggish as 
not to kindle their light, others may be so vehement as to 
allow their light to burn out. There is moderation in all 
things, and true moderation helps the very point that we 
would urge, by securing the deepest and most abiding fer- 
vor of which man is capable. What is moderation but 
such a measuring of times, forces, and intensity, as to 
secure the most efficient power on the whole. The truly 
moderate man is the most fervent of all men, for he best 
measures his resources, and instead of wasting his fire, 
keeps it for its true uses. For want of moderation, many 
a man who thinks that he has too much fire, is actually 
content with too little. Many a man who thinks himself 
a martyr to a noble cause, because he has exhausted him- 
self upon a single idea or in a single extravagant heat, ha? 
actually lived too coldly, instead of too fervently, and has 
neglected the affections and duties that would check his 
extravagance and revive his spirits. Many a man thinks 
himself a marvel of studious zeal, because his brain is in 
a fever one day or night in the week, and therefore worn 
out from exhaustion all other days. Many a sepulchral 
devotee who has worn himself to mere skin and bone by 
his zeal in fasting and prayer, has burned his light down 
to the socket by too little fire, instead of too much ; for 
he has lighted but a single lamp of sacrifice, instead of 



128 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

kindling the whole constellation. Had the fire been broader 
it would have been abiding, and the wasted devotee would 
have been the affectionate, active, cheerful Christian, burn- 
ing the lamp of love and joy, as well as of penitence and 
self-denial. 

The worldling makes the same mistake, only in a dif 
ferent way. Many a man in this great city, who thinks 
that he lives too fervently for his health of body and 
mind, and who really seems to lose strength with years, 
needs more fire instead of less, to give him true life. His 
zeal is too narrow, and the fire burns out, because it does 
not touch the best resources of his being. He lives for 
the world and its business, not for God or his neighbor, 
too little for the best welfare and enjoyment even of his 
own family. Let him live a broader life, and it will be a 
healthier one. If worn by worldly care, let him find solace 
not in torpor or sensuality, but in the tastes that refine 
and elevate the intellect, and in the affections that soothe 
and edify the soul. Yes, there is many a man who sys- 
tematically makes of our sacred Sabbaths, days of stupid 
indolence, because of his over-exhaustion during the week, 
who would awake on the morrow far more refreshed after 
a day of social kindness, worthy conversation, and rational 
worship. Follow the method of Providence in the order 
of nature, and we shall find in due alternation of action a 
refreshment far better than torpor. When daylight fades, 
other lights burn on high for us, and the world without is 
but an image of the world within. Follow the method of 
Providence, and we may show a broader and more lasting. 



THE TRUE FIRE, 129 

light, instead of finding only ashes after a narrow and 
wasting flame from mad intensity in some single quarter. 
The danger, I repeat it, is not of too much fire, but of too 
little, and the most self-controlled man is in the depth of 
his being the most fervent, and his nature, so full orbed, 
warms his great resolves and his quiet charities from the 
same vital source, like the globe itself, which tempers its 
salubrious springs and its volcanic torrents from the same 
central heat. 

This fire acts upon every sphere of life, upon all just 
powers and all worthy actions. 

Our powers, both of body and mind, feel its influence. 
The body needs a master, and its forces and appetites are 
very much what the central purpose makes it. Let the 
will be earnestly and wisely faithful, every nerve and limb 
and sense feels its spirit, and is informed with something 
of its fire. The lusts that burn out the bodily life, and 
the sloth that would not have it burn at all, are both re- 
buked ; and this marvellous structure, this mystical tree, 
which physiologists have regarded as living only by the 
slow fire in its red arteries, glows with its true fervor and 
shines with its true light — active, not fevered — calm, not 
dull, repeating in its branching nerves and vessels the 
miracle of Horeb, and obliging the beholder to pause as 
before the work of God. 

Every faculty of mind feels the influence, and truly 
lives only as it is animated by the central purpose that 
beats and glows at its heart. The intellect is wise and 
6* 



130 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

wakeful by learning to look at all things in nature and 
Providence with an earnest, faithful eye, and a man of or- 
dinary powers animated by this spirit, becomes a far wiser 
man than the brightest genius bewildered by vanity, or 
driven to and fro by passion. The affections are inspired 
and fixed by the same spirit, and they give their steady, 
healthful glow to every element which they control. Even 
the imagination, that daring power that is thought to mock 
at all control, is invigorated and enlightened by the mas- 
ter purpose, and is loftier and happy in its creations from 
its solemn recognition of the work of life and the great life- 
giver's glory. Yes — Faithful is the word that can be 
written on the forehead of all the great creative minds. 
The visions of Milton, Dante, and their peers, were all 
based upon the ground of truth and virtue. They did not 
presume to frame new worlds before owning at heart the 
primal law which God, from the beginning, laid beneath 
the foundations of this globe. The faithful man, whatever 
his sphere, may find fellowship and encouragement in their 
pages, and their great thoughts may soothe him as he goes 
to his pillow as benignly with their light as the stars that 
look from heaven into his window. Wherever the imagi- 
nation ceases to feel the true inspiration of fidelity, its fire 
is a consuming curse, and Lucifer, the Fallen — that is 
the name of this recreant son of the morning. 

Thus the powers in all their compass are animated by 
the true-life-purpose ; and must it not follow, that all the 
work of our sphere has heart from its heart ? We all have 
many things to do, some in themselves agreeable, some 



THE TRUE FIRE. 131 

disagreeable, some likely to be done with alacrity, others 
in the most reluctant if not drudging spirit. Bear to 
our chief calling the fire of our earnest purpose, and 
all our labors will have something of its cheerful motive, if 
all are not at once animated with its radiant glow, and a 
man becomes efficient in detail even as he is resolute and 
fervent at heart. He need not wait until the globe is 
fashioned anew to make industry attractive to him by 
adapting it to his passions, for his master purpose subdues 
his passions to his work, and all the branches of his call- 
ing repeat in no mean way the miracle of Horeb, flaming, 
but not consumed. 

Is it presumptuous to speak so strongly of man's power 
to carry fire in his heart, and to infuse it into every branch 
of life ? Is it ascribing to man's will, the work that be- 
longs only to God's Infinity ? Not so, for all true force is 
from God, and man wins true fire only as he finds his way 
to its Infinite fountain. The fervent purpose, central in 
the character, is what it is, by trusting in a power beyond 
itself, and by being nurtured from a divine and unfailing 
source. God it is who has given us our will, with its mys- 
terious power of volition according to the image of his own 
creative fiat ; God it is who has benignly added helps to 
our natural power, opened the truths and graces of his 
kingdom all around us, and bade us work out our destiny 
in a faith that makes his Providence work with us. The 
fire within burns not merely of itself, but is fed by every 
word from the mouth of God, and in Jesus, the Incarnate 



132 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Word, it finds its true and abiding life. In Christ, and 
the whole train of Divine Providences of which he is the 
consummation, the love of the Father draws near to us, 
encourages us, revives our failing fervor by its heavenly 
breath, and reanimates our fainting spirit by its sacred 
warmth. The whole gospel system is enlivening, regen- 
erating. As a man strives to obey its law, and breathe its 
spirit, he works his own nature into truer life, and brings 
near to his soul the heavenly fire. The humblest disciple 
who tries to use his lowly gifts in faith and obedience, 
proves this truth by his abiding power, and has deepening 
peace. The illustrious heroes of faith have proved it in 
the most noted chapters of history, and their souls perva- 
ded by the calm, unfailing fire that came and comes from 
heaven through Christ and the Spirit, have acknowledged 
the miracle of Horeb as a fit type of the divine manifesta- 
tion, and have repeated it in their own experience. Hence 
to the great and the lowly has proceeded the most endur- 
ing energy in this world, and hence has sprung the living 
witness of Life Eternal. A faithful purpose rooted in the 
love of God, and branching out into blessed uses, sending 
up its lambent flame into the nurturing airs of heaven, this 
is of itself promise of immortality ; for this fixes the heart 
on God and Christ, and surely it is life Eternal to know 
Thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast 
sent. 

Let not the topic rest in any generality, however ex- 
alted or subduing. Let each man examine himself and his. 



THE TRUE FIRE. 133 

ways by the principles illustrated. Is it true that the 
chief test of character is in the central purpose that acts 
upon all the faculties and works ; that the true fire burns 
without burning out, that it pervades every branch of life 
when this purpose is not wilful, but faithful, and is kept in 
constant allegiance to the Divine kingdom — is this true ? 
Then what are we 1 Much we are that we ought not to 
be ; too little we are that we ought to be. Feeble as the 
true fire may have been, who of us will say that he knows 
nothing of it? Who of us will say that he has not been 
strong and peaceful as he has tended it well ? Who of us 
will not say that he judges all men according to the evi- 
dence of its presence, and thus sanctions like judgment upon 
himself ? 

Early in life — yes, as soon as the mind knows any 
thing of its powers, nay, before personal responsibility be- 
gins, and as soon as a child is consecrated in baptism, or 
made the subject of a thought or prayer, be this the press- 
ing wish, that a faithful purpose should be lighted within 
his soul, and kept under a living nurture. 

And as the years roll on, and scenes, friends, plans and 
feelings change with time, when maturity brings its grave 
cares, and threatens to chill all enthusiasm into cold world- 
liness or drudging habit, let the fire be kept ever burning, 
that age may renew and brighten the best promise of 
youth. Let it be ever kept burning in such fulness and 
measure as to kindle every faculty, and shine unto perfect 
day. Turn ever like the lawgiver towards the symbol of the 



134 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

present God. Wisely one of our modern sages speaks to 
each of us the lesson of his own faithful life : — 

" Before thy sacred altar, heavenly truth ! 
I bow in age as erst I bowed in youth. 
Still let me bow, till this weak frame decay, 
And my last hour be lighted by thy ray." 



VL 

fpattjMb gift its Iraness. 



4 But who 011 earth can long abide in state ? 
Or who can him assure of happy day ? 
Sith morning fair may bring foul evening late, 
And least mishap the most bliss alter may ? 
For thousand perils lie in close await 
About us daily, to work our decay. 
That none, except a god, or God him guide, 
May them avoid or remedy provide." 



" The greatest man is he who chooses the right with invincible Resolution ; 
who resists the sorest temptations from within and without; who bears the hea- 
viest burdens cheerfully ; who is the calmest in storms, and whose reliance on 
Truth, on Virtue, on God, is the most unfaltering." 

Channing. 



MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS. 

We treat now of manhood, the third stage in the circle 
of life under survey. If childhood is the time of uncon- 
scious development, and youth the time for conscious pre- 
paration, manhood is the time for responsible, efficient 
action — action amid the realities of this busy, aggressive 
world. At present, we treat so much of the subject as 
relates to its early years, especially to the third decade, or 
the period between twenty and thirty, reserving middle 
age and old age, each for separate consideration. Our 
topic, then, in this paper, is Early Manhood, or Beginning 
Life for Ourselves. 

The gospel has surely been the strength of true man 
hood, and from the pen of one who was every whit a man 
judicious, patient, courageous, unflinching, we take a sen- 
tence wholly to our purpose. Hear it, as if from the 
apostle Paul's own lips, and from the Spirit which gave 
him his fire. " Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you 
like men, be strong." 



138 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Let the first application of the words, be to the most 
obvious fact that meets us at the threshold of active life. 
I mean, our own chosen work, our business. Whatever 
our position or means, we all have a work to do in life, and 
that work must embody itself in some special vocation. 
The youth feels this fact, and his whole training, when ju- 
dicious, will have an eye to it. But the man, just taking 
hold of his business on his own account, and he only, can 
see it in its vast responsibility, and feel the great differ- 
ence between acting under guardianship, and acting for 
himself. Probably, to most men, the transition, notwith- 
standing all its attendant hopes and plans, has peculiar 
trials and perplexities. The first approach of the great 
world, is a rude shock to delicate sensibilities and unaccus- 
tomed faculties. Before, you had your tasks planned for 
you by others, and these bore the responsibility of the re- 
sult, and stood between you and the world. Now, you 
must plan for yourselves, bear the brunt of success or 
failure, and stand on your own feet amidst the crowd. 
Before, you were learning how to manage a boat in a calm 
bay, with ready retreat from the storm. Now, you must 
out to sea, with your own hand upon the helm, your own 
eye upon the sails, and you must take tempest or calm as 
it may chance to come. Trying period for most young 
men, rudely jarring all the cherished dreams of their years 
of study or apprenticeship, and waking them from rosy 
fancies, into the cold clear light of this working-day 
world. 

Shrink not, but be brave, and you will win something 



MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS. 139 

better than those golden dreams. You will grapple with 
stern reality, and not let it go, until it yields you more 
than ideal blessing. Quit you like men, be strong in your 
purpose and your work, and your business shall bless you. 
You need all your judgment, your patience, your courage, 
your energy, to begin your work well. I need not under- 
take, in addressing a circle of well-informed readers, to 
lay down minute rules for the successful transaction of 
business ; but as to the main principle, I can have no 
doubt, and I rely upon your experience, to confirm my 
doctrine. In this world, every man must work his way to 
true success, and faithful efficient work is the great, the 
main chance of welfare. Take hold of your business, then, 
meaning to work manfully, and do the best in your power, 
to meet your responsibilities and bring out your resources. 
Do you start with capital ? work, or you will lose it by your 
folly, or disgrace it by your inefficiency. Have you no 
capital to start with ? why be disheartened, for is not a fair 
character, with intelligence and energy, capital enough for 
you — nay, in this country of boundless opportunities, is 
not poverty itself an excellent tonic for a young man's 
stomach, and one too, that has braced our strongest men in 
the outset of their career? 

This rule only, will I lay down for the conduct of a 
man beginning his business or profession for himself. 
Take the best opportunity within your reach, and use it so 
faithfully and efficiently, as to make a good mark on your 
own character, and the men with whom you deal. Then 
fhat present opportunity will not fail to open into some- 



140 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

thing more, and your growing usefulness will give you 
growing influence and welfare. Woe to the man who takes 
the opposite course, and treats the world of business as if 
it were all sham, and as if men were to stumble or to belie 
themselves into success. "With all its pretences and chi- 
canery, business is a tremendous reality, for it is the great 
daily work of the world, and not even the Quixotism of the 
sentimentalist who expects fortune to come to him by friend- 
ship, is greater than that of the shiftless adventurer, or 
tricky schemer, who thinks that luck, not labor, makes the 
man, and that character is no element of capital. The 
great law of gravitation pervades all worlds, and in the 
long run things tend to their just level. The great law of 
practical life is, that he who would win and keep an honor- 
able position, must balance himself there by efficient ac- 
tion, actual influence, and positive usefulness. This is the 
doctrine for merchants, and all artisans and artists — the 
doctrine for all professional men, all statesmen and rulers. 
Do your work well, whatever it is, and even the world's 
sober judgment will justify God's own truth, and measure 
your dignity by your usefulness. Be strong, by choosing 
wisely what to do, be strong, by doing well what you have 
chosen, and the step from youth to manhood shall be a rise 
not a fall. 

But the business of life is not to be measured by what 
we call our vocation. It covers the whole ground of action, 
and reaches into all the springs of emotion. Our work 
must have an object, and the object is poor and unsatisfac- 



MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS. 141 

tory, unless it takes hold of our affections. Here is the 
second point of consideration for manhood. Quit you like 
men, and be strong in your affections, and you will be 
stronger in your work. 

In youth, the affections fill a large place, and boyish 
friendships, affinities, intimacies, do much to shape and 
color our early years. He surely is a most unfortunate or 
selfish man, whose subsequent life is not happier, because 
of friends made in the days of school, or college, or count- 
ing-house preparation. But in manhood, the affections pass 
out of the airy region of sentiment, and connect themselves 
with the gravest reality. One great affection, which in its 
dawning, flushes the whole horizon with its golden light, 
and makes of every generous youth a hero in his dreams, 
and gives the hue of romance to every gentle companion, 
shows in manhood its serious providential purpose ; and 
that golden light, heaven-born as it is, however colored and 
refracted by earthly exhalations, ere long forms itself into 
an aureola around some elect countenance, and guides man 
to the choice which creates for him a home, and gives him 
new and powerful objects to strive for, and live for. Let 
this aspect of manhood be sacredly considered, and let the 
thought of God, who founded marriage, and of Him who, at 
Cana of Galilee, renewed its consecration, save the subject 
from trifling caprices, and from mercenary calculation. Se- 
riously, and with the whole compass of his nature, with his 
mind, heart, and conscience, as well as with his taste and 
temperament, let man choose upon whom to set his affec- 
tions, and there rest them, with all loyalty and truth. 



142 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

There is judgment in this relation, as in every other mat- 
ter of feeling, and he who plays the fool, by mistaking ca- 
price for conviction, or prudence for wisdom, may just as 
well, nay far better, play the fool upon any other ground. 
Woe to the man who sells himself for money, and plays 
Judas to his own soul, for pieces of silver. Woe to the 
man who slaves himself to a trifler, or who befools him- 
self to a pretty toy, or who sells himself to a virago or a 
dolt, and wastes his affections upon heartlessness. Home 
rests upon a basis of reality, and that reality may be ac- 
cursed, for the very reason that it should be blessed. It 
is not for me to go into the particulars of a subject of 
such peculiar delicacy, full as the Bible, and the ancient 
pulpit, may be of instructions in reference to it. Let a 
man, however, clearly understand from the outset, that his 
character and destiny are very closely in his wife's keep- 
ing, and that it is not easy for him to live wisely with a 
fool, or devoutly with a flirt — that it is hard for him to seek 
the substance, when her idol is show ; it is hard for him to 
aspire, when the prevalent mediocrity is her only standard. 
Strong indeed, let me say it in all plainness, strong is the 
man who has a good wife — not an angel, for we are not 
talking sentimentalism, but 

" A Creature not too bright or good 
For human nature's daily food;" 

a sensible, affectionate, refined, practical woman, who 
makes a man's nature all the stronger, by making it more 



MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS. 143 

tender, who puts new heart into all his worthy striving, 
gives dignity to his prosperity, and comfort to his adver- 
sity. He who is content with any thing less than the ele- 
ments of sterling character in the guardian of his home, 
makes the saddest of mistakes, and commits his welfare to 
the most fickle of chances. Life must, perhaps, have 
some illusions, but among them this choice cannot be, for 
a sham-home is no illusion, but the most sad and tremen- 
dous of realities. Let a true home, alike in its foundation 
and superstructure, make man strong, by giving true rest 
and spring to his affections. 

We believe that society is sadly out of joint in this 
matter of marriage, and that the follies of women in re- 
spect to it, are pretty nearly equal to the vices of men. 
As long as our daughters are brought up to such languid 
health and inordinate expectations, such impersonations of 
exaction without equivalent usefulness, we must expect 
marriages to become less in proportionate number, and 
congeniality of age. The majority of young men will be 
unable to marry to their mind, and the nuisances of hotel 
and boarding-house life will be continued, with its attend- 
ant discomforts and vices. A race of sensible, hearty, 
practical young women, can correct the evil, and estab 
lish a new era of genuine homes. Many a good fellow 
who now pines in the attic of a seven-story hotel, or in the 
closet of some monster boarding-house, would rejoice in 
the good time coming, and make a true man of himself, in 
finding a true wife and a true home. 

This is God's own school of energy, and it is so effi- 



144 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

cient, that its weakest inmate wields a world of power, and 
as a man takes his own child into his arms, and feels the 
soft touch of that infant cheek, he is ten times the braver 
for his toil and endurance, than when he had only himself 
to care for. Wise, indeed, is he who works the power of 
such great affections into the leading purposes of life, and 
within all his business and his ambition, cherishes the mo- 
tive force of an earnest heart, loyal to the great objects 
for which life is providentially ordained. 

It is said that one of the followers of Bruce, after 
that patriot king's death, had his heart embalmed in a gol- 
den casket, and carried by the standard-bearer ziways in 
the thickest of the battle. "When the conflict was most 
desperate, the standard-bearer was ordered to throw the 
casket into the very midst of the hostile ranks, and the 
Scotch soldiery were called to the rescue of the heart of 
their great king from hostile hands. Their charge was 
then invincible. Every true life wields a still greater 
power, for it feels a living heart drawing it with irresisti- 
ble force into every position of duty, and is strong for its 
work by the might of its affections. 

This cannot be, man cannot be truly strong in his af- 
fections, or in his work, unless he is strong in his faith 
for faith deals with the only ultimate and enduring facts 
and gives the foothold that lasts when others fail. Man- 
hood's contact with reality may be a sore trial to faith, 
and the world asks us to surrender all higher allegiance to 
its own claims, and sacrifice our faith to its sight. Many^ 



MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS. 145 

seem to do this, but the truly strong, instead of doing 
this, do the very contrary, and instead of allowing the 
world to subdue their faith, they make their faith subdue 
the world. Above all local and temporal interests, they 
place the divine Government and Providence. They 
•never allow labor or anxiety to crowd out the thought that 
God is, that he is love, and the soul is dark and dead when 
false to his spirit, and away from his presence. Let us not 
regard this position as an ascetic or Quixotic one. Nay, it 
is the most practical course that can be taken, resting upon 
the fact of all facts, and looking to the good of all goods. 
Does the world press upon you with its hard realities ? 
then be all the more earnest to make religion a reality, and 
the first of realities. How sad it is to see a harsh and 
chilling materialism closing in all round us, and the spirit- 
ual faith and generous hope of our childhood and youth, 
all shut out. Let it not be so. Keep a place for faith in 
the central plan of life, and show the perfection of your 
business efficiency, by making a serious business of reli- 
gion. In your own soul, say humbly yet confidently : — 
" Indeed I must strive and scheme in this hard and aggres- 
sive world ; but it is not my master, not my God. I will 
labor for objects which Providence itself has made sacred, 
and by principles which justice, honor, nay, humanity and 
faith, do not forbid. Day by day, I will turn myself to- 
wards the Eternal Father, who ordained all toil, and even 
in the hard pressure of competition, I will not forget Him 
who promised mercy to the merciful." This spirit has 
been shown in a true manhood, and faith has then gained, 



146 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

instead of losing power, by wrestling manfully with the 
cares and temptations of the world. The first spontaneous 
trust of childhood, confirmed by the fervor of youthful 
feeling, has consolidated itself by the strength of manhood, 
and so the character becomes trusting as it becomes reso- 
lute, mingling the two elements into the heroism that 
makes the true man. 

"We make a sad mistake, if we do not learn in season 
to rest life upon a basis of devout trust, as well as of reso- 
lute labor. God has given the soul, as well as the body, 
two feet for the walks of her pilgrimage, and true progress 
is made as they duly interchange their work and their rest 
together. We cannot know our own being, or God's love, 
until we use well these gifts, and by mutual faith and ac- 
tion, with cheerful and alternate step press on to the work 
of our divine calling. The world may say that pleasure is 
the cure for care, and that self-indulgence refreshes the 
fatigue of self-exertion. God knows us better, and whilst 
not frowning upon any innocent joy, he holds the cup of 
refreshing to every act of true service, as he interchanges 
the grace of devout faith with the striving of loyal labor. 
The pilgrim under his guidance, goes indeed from grace to 
'-race, and from strength to strength. 

More of this union, instead of less, we should see, as 
faith is more rationally settled, and life is more generously 
and substantially built upon it. As a matter of culture, 
merely, faith should go with enterprise in maturing the 
true character. Strength is hard, dry, and brittle, unless 
it is rooted and grounded in love, and stretches upward ip 



MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS. 147 

faith. Apart from such nurture, strength loses its "best 
vitality, and does not draw to itself the living waters, the 
genial dew and sunshine needed for its higher life. We 
must trust in something above ourselves, if we would be 
strong, and the stoutest forces of the soul, as of the body, 
come from the mildest influence^. Heroism springs from 
filial faith and affections, even as bone and sinew are form- 
ed from warm blood in the arteries. The manhood of our 
time needs this influence, for it too often mistakes hard- 
ness for strength, and self-sufliciency for dignity — sets up 
its own right arm as the great reliance, and makes of the 
world its God. Sad the result, even when the most splen- 
did success is granted ; sad is the life that gains the world 
and loses the soul, that puts the golden cup to the lip, 
and finds no living water there. Sad indeed, when reverses 
come, and the poor man, bereft of his idols, cries, like 
Micah : "Ye have taken away my gods, which I made, 
and what have I more." 

Then keep a place for faith, in the midst of worldly 
cares, and make it clear to yourself, and to those around 
you, that you do recognize a power and a good above this 
world. Form your plans upon this basis, order your busi- 
ness and your home upon this idea. Take your place in 
the Christian Church according to your own honest con- 
victions, and with a stout hand help bear the ark of a gen- 
erous and holy faith along your pilgrimage. You will give 
religion itself, a more cheerful and vigorous expression, 
and your own deepened peace and power, will more than re- 
turn the blessing you give. Faith shall bear her witness of 



148 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

things unseen, in the midst of your turmoil and tempta- 
tion. When in the fever of hot strifes and competitions, 
she will point out to you the only steadfast good. When 
weary with toil and care, you go to your pillow, and the 
din of the world still rings into your ear, and your brain 
itself is crowded with eager anxieties, as your busy streets 
are crowded with people, and sleep refuses to refresh you, 
then faith will come to you, and put under your head the 
pillow of heavenly mercy, and smooth your furrowed brow 
with her gentle hand, and lull you to rest with peaceful 
visions of the Father in heaven, and the Saviour whom he 
sent to call you to himself. Your childhood and youth 
shall be more than a bright tV on • they will live and beat 
anew in the heart of a manly faith and affection. 



11 



Jtossts aitir $tm*ties, 



PASTOR ANIMARUM. 

CVrae, wandering sheep, O como ! 

I'll bind thee to my breast , 
I'll bear thee to thy home, 

A nd lay thee down to rest. 

I saw thee stray forlorn, 

And heard thee faintly cry, 
And on the tree of scorn 

For thee I deigned to die — 

What greater proof coald I 
Give, than to seek the tomb ? 
Come, wandering sheep, O come 1 

Fbom the Spanish. 



LOSSES AND ANXIETIES. 

Manhood must needs have its anxious times, and there 
is no man of mature years who cannot remember some 
emergencies that have driven him almost mad with anxie- 
ty. Such seasons stamp themselves upon his memory, and 
not seldom come back to him in all their original vividness 
in his dreams. I propose to treat of this experience of our 
life in the present paper. 

In simple language, taken directly from the common 
business of a rural people, our Saviour, in the parable of 
the Lost Sheep, illustrates one of the great facts in life, 
and its effect upon man. The fact is the existence of risks, 
and the effect is anxiety. "We cannot but feel anxious at 
the prospect of losing any thing precious to our interests 
or affections, and no small portion of our time and thought 
is occupied with such anxiety. The habits of society have 
signally changed, since the words of the parable were 
spoken, and few persons live so simply that their fortunes 



152 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

depend upon the safety of a single flock, or the care of a 
few pieces of silver. Yet amid the complex affairs in 
which men are now engaged, the laws of life remain essen- 
tially the same. Risks surely have not ceased, nor has 
anxiety abated. It is important that a topic so much dis- 
cussed in the street and felt in the house, should have its 
place with the moralist, and be considered from a Christian 
point of view. Many a furrowed face an*d troubled heart 
prove the need of such consideration. Many a wasted life 
and ruined name bear witness to the danger of false risks 
and morbid anxiety. 

Remark first of all the fact, that there must, of neces- 
sity, be a large element of risk in the lot of men. By our 
nature and position we are obliged to form most of our 
plans, and do most of our work subject to contingencies 
upon which we cannot calculate with positive certainty. 
There are truths which are so certain as to admit of no 
rational question ; and on the other hand, there are notions 
so false or so absurd, as to rank at once among impossibili- 
ties. But the practical affairs of men belong mostly to 
neither of these extremes, but to the broad region of proba- 
bilities between absolute certainty and absolute impossi- 
bility. There we make our calculations and conduct our 
enterprises, studying probabilities as wisely as we can, and 
hoping by a due balance of contingencies to secure a fair 
return. 

Yet what practical man does not every day make some 
allowance for risks from casual circumstance, knowing that 



LOSSES AND ANXIETIES. . 153 

he is not wise enough to foresee all that will happen tc 
him, nor strong enough to carry to the end every thing 
that he has begun precisely according to his plans. The 
whole domain in which we live is full of contingencies. 
Nature — man — the times, are to our limited vision full of 
uncertainties. Who can tell what a single day may bring 
forth ? Every day we watch the sky, and read the signs 
of health and prosperity, or the reverse in its changes. 
Many a life and many a fortune depends upon heat or cold, 
storm or calm. If the face of nature to us is so fitful, who 
shall estimate the fickleness of man, or calculate with en- 
tire accuracy his opinions, passions, vices, virtues ? So- 
ciety, business, religion, are constantly exhibiting unex- 
pected developments of character, and nothing but a su- 
pernatural gift of discerning of spirits can prevent con- 
stant risks from this source of contingency. When we 
consider the complex tide of affairs which are called the 
times, whether political, commercial, or moral, who can 
presume to calculate with certainty its changes ? Who 
does not feel that we are always afloat upon a changing 
sea, and good or ill is constantly appearing from unex- 
pected quarters ? Let any man judge by his own expe- 
rience ; consider how much his own mind and fortune have 
been effected by contingencies, and how much he is now 
engrossed by the risks of his position ; and we all see at 
• once how large is the casual element in human affairs. 

The question comes to us, what shall we do in this 
state of things, or what is the proper conduct for men as 

7* 



154 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

subject to contingencies. It is very obvious that God has 
placed us where we are, and it is in vain to ask to have 
the laws of existence repealed to suit our wishes. To be 
free from risks, we must ask to be all wise and almighty, 
or else to be reduced to utter nothingness, alike unable to 
gain or lose, to enjoy or suffer. Some men there are, who 
seem to aspire to these conditions, and to escape from the 
common lot on the one hand by rash adventure, and on the 
other hand by cowardly shrinking. Some men dare risks 
as if they could never lose ; others shun them as if they 
could never gain ; as if the shepherd should leave his sheep 
in the fields or mountains, confident that none of them can 
possibly be lost ; or, on the other hand, fretted by losses, 
should say, " I will keep no sheep at all ; I will give up 
my flocks, and so be rid of this annoying anxiety. 

The two classes of men may be seen in every communi- 
ty and profession, the rash and the timid, the fast and the 
slow. At different stages of life, the same man may illus- 
trate both dispositions, and he who at twenty-five was a 
dashing schemer, at fifty may settle down into a pattern 
of timid prudence. Both classes are in error, and false to 
the true law of life. He who encounters risks as if he 
could not lose, intent only on the prizes of fortune, spoils 
his mind, and is likely to ruin his position : spoils his 
mind by blinding his eyes and fevering his heart with the 
gambler's madness ; and is likely to ruin his position by 
bringing down upon him some of those contingencies which 
he overlooks, and which sooner or later end every game- 
ster's career. He, on the other hand, who will have noth-. 



LOSSES AND ANXIETIES. 155 

ing at all to do with the risks of life in fear of loss, must 
ask to give up life itself; for life cannot he held without 
constant risks. It is ohvious that he cannot enter into any 
business — cannot do any work for the body or the soul ; for 
what is there that a man can undertake without exposing 
himself to more or less disappointment ? To shun risk is 
plainly impossible, and many who seek to do it only mul- 
tiply the evils which they would avoid. He who says, " I 
will keep no sheep, for I may lose some of them," loses the 
pleasure and profit of his flock, and is very sure of finding 
or borrowing some trouble far greater than anxious and 
kindly search for the lost one. 

The sluggard who does nothing, because he is afraid of 
doing wrong, — the gambler who discourages every enter- 
prise, because men are fallible, — the egotist, who thinks to 
be secure by being wrapped up in himself, afraid of the 
world, and shy even of family and friends — these classes 
of men show no enviable exemption from the risks of life. 
Assured of drawing none of the prizes in what they call 
the lottery of life, they are very likely to prove that a man 
may have a sad blank without drawing at all ; nay, that he 
must have a blank in himself and his whole being, if he 
does not commit himself to the proper labors, sympathies 
and enterprise of his lot. He who hid his talent in a nap- 
kin was of this class, forgetting that somebody might steal 
it even there — forgetting that every talent not used is vir- 
tually lost, and he always multiplies dangers who will 
brave none. 



156 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

We most certainly believe that there is some provi- 
dential adaptation between the powers of man and his posi- 
tion. Not content with tracing out the fitness between the 
eye and the light — the ear and sound — the elastic motion 
of the body, and the element upon which it moves — we may 
reasonably look for some harmony between our intellectual 
and moral faculties, and the contingencies amid which we 
live. Every being under the providence of God is adapted 
to its peculiar element ; and the light of nature and revela- 
tion teaches us to regard man as amply endowed for his 
larger sphere of exposures. In this light we would inter- 
pret the risks of our lot, and the anxiety which they pro- 
duce. Such interpretation will show that the very lot 
which fevers so many into madness, and frightens so many 
into sluggishness, is intended to be the school of a benig- 
nant discipline, the means of calling out our best powers, 
and securing the deepest peace. 

What so well trains the judgment, and schools the 
affections, and stirs the energies, as a due sense of the ex- 
posures amidst which we live ? The leading faculty of 
mind needed for practical life is sound judgment. Grod 
has placed us in circumstances that imperiously demand 
the discipline of this faculty. The world is indeed full of 
good books that move thought, and of fair scenes that move 
the fancy. But more powerful than these is the appeal of 
life in its constant exposures — its never-ceasing hopes and 
fears. It says to us all, " Your lot is cast upon an event- 
ful tide; study its movings for yourselves; see if there is x 



LOSSES AND ANXIETIES. 157 

not some law to its changings ; look for some rule of pro- 
babilities that shall on the whole be a safe guide through 
contingencies." Let a man follow this appeal, and he will 
not ooly keep his eyes open to the fair prospects of success 
or warnings of danger, but, in view of his own talents, dis- 
position, and opportunities, he will form some method of 
action, which shall embody and carry out his principles 
into an habitual policy, and which shall save him from be- 
ing for ever at the mercy of accidents. By a sound judg- 
ment he will regulate the risks of his lot ; and, like a good 
pilot, if he cannot control winds and waves, he will have a 
ready way of meeting them and using them. He will keep 
out of many hazards into which others recklessly run, and 
will face many dangers at which others stand aghast. He 
will guide his affairs with a careful wisdom, that shall save 
him from extreme courses. He will, as far as he may, 
choose the sphere of action in which contingencies and cer- 
tainties are so mingled as best to stir enterprise and pro- 
mise returns — always insisting upon certainty enough to 
warrant the attempt — always expecting some contingencies 
to stand in the path of success. To find this sphere is the 
part of practical wisdom, whatever the business or profes- 
sion. The practical merchant is he who thus wisely inter- 
prets the laws of risk in business ;— the practical Christian, 
whatever his calling, is he who is willing to see life as it 
is, and never be weary in well-doing, whilst trying to apply 
Christian truth and love to the various circumstances and 
wants of souls, — neither a desponding drone, nor a flighty 
dreamer, but modestly sure of some fair success in his 



158 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

application of Christianity in view of the probabilities of 
life. 

Thus a sound judgment regulates risks, not merely by 
meeting those that come, but by fixing the true method of 
planning and of living. It will teach the shepherd how to 
keep his sheep, as well as how to seek the one who has 
strayed from the flock. It will powerfully affect the fact 
of risks, and always the feeling which they produce. Anx- 
iety depends in a great measure upon our habits of thought 
or attention. He who thinks wisely of the exposures of 
his position, and trains himself always to see the main 
point at stake, will be rid at once of a legion of borrowed 
fears, and will accept a just anxiety as a benignant warn- 
ing of danger and stimulus to effort ; just as we are to 
regard the pain of a wound or disease, as proof that the 
sentinels are true to their post, and the nerves, vigilant 
watchers, cry " Qui vive " to the intruder, and warn the 
lord in the citadel that peril is near. What a vast amount 
of morbid anxiety would be cured at once by sounder hab- 
its of thought. How many hearts and homes, instead of 
being filled with sighs and groans, at what cannot be 
helped, and had better be left alone, would be scenes of 
cheerful content under essential humiliation, and cheerful 
activity under encouraging duties. 

Add to sound judgment fortitude, and we are still 
nearer the true solution of the risks of life : fortitude, when 
in rest, patient ; when in action, courageous ; bearing well 
what must be borne, daring well what must be done. No* 



LOSSES AND ANXIETIES. 159 

life is so quiet as to be able to dispense with this old car- 
dinal virtue. Its patience we need under a thousand 
annoyances that can be helped only by being borne ; — its 
courage we need under countless trials that will conquer 
us unless we conquer them. Who will repine that Provi- 
dence aims to temper us in each trial by so various experi- 
ences ? One of our wise and good men has said, that a 
man ought to be mortified once a fortnight to keep him 
properly down ; and we need quote no authority to prove 
the need of a constant discipline to call out our courage 
and fit us for emergencies. 

To judgment and fortitude, add persevering fidelity, 
or constancy, to our great life-work, and, so far as this 
earth can solve it, the problem of contingencies is solved, 
and man is wiser, and better, and stronger for the risks to 
which he is exposed. Always at work at his post, judi- 
ciously, patiently, courageously, he will not be put down 
by every casual disappointment. He will learn something 
from every contingency, and win something from every 
loss. Never rash, never cowardly, he will learn prudence 
from other men's folly, and enterprise from other men's 
timidity. Many opportunities in which he trusted may 
and will disappoint him, but in his case the old proverb 
will prove true, and one door will not be shut unless an- 
other door opens. He must expect to be exposed to haz. 
ards, and to feel anxiety whilst life lasts ; but hazards will 
more and more reveal an eternal trust beneath them all 



160 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

and his anxiety will be a healthy vigilance instead of a 
restless fever. 

Has not God been teaching us this doctrine all our 
lives by all our experience, reading, and observation — 
teaching us ihe need of judgment, fortitude, labor, from true 
power and peace ? We want all the discipline that we 
have, and all we can get, alike for ourselves and for those 
whom we guide. Well may we be anxious for those whom 
we guide. Is our anxiety wise ? Something of it un- 
doubtedly is not well placed, and often in our laudable 
desire to provide well for children, we pamper wants that 
are misfortunes, and many a lamb is lost by being unwise- 
ly petted. The great point of anxiety should be that life 
may be true, and the mind may be best prepared for its 
duties. More of this anxiety would abate the fever of 
gain, and give motives strong against loss. The child in 
danger is always, on that account, the most cherished, and 
the little invalid is the centre of all thoughts. The whole 
family watch the sufferer's pulse and breath ; and the 
hardy man, as he comes from his day's toil, weeps for joy, 
when he finds his boy or girl smiling upon him, and for 
the first time after sickness, taking gifts playfully from his 
hand. Blessed anxiety — more blessed when it is con- 
cerned for the entire well-being of the child, and forgets 
not that there is a loss worse than sickness and death ! 

Let us accept the risks of our lot, and not shrink from 
its true anxiety. Let God be the interpreter of the one 
and the comforter of the other. A faithful self-examina- 



LOSSES AND ANXIETIES. 16 1 

tion in these respects will give ground for very pungent 
thoughts. The main risk is in not meeting the main duty 
of our being ; and the chief anxiety should be, lest we are 
false to our post, under the kingdom of Grod. A true so- 
licitude for ourselves is the best guide to true regard for 
others ; and as a man is a lover of the true fold, he will 
be anxious to win others to its peace. So the whole topic 
of social responsibility opens. Who shall comprehend — or 
who deny it. Every day we own it, as we think of peril 
or loss to others. We think less of the ninety and nine 
fleets upon the ocean, than of the one lost navigator so 
nobly sought for in the frozen ocean — less of the thousand 
ships, those white-fleeced flocks of a commercial people, 
that are safe on their course, than the one missing vessel 
so eagerly waited for now. This is well, and such solici- 
tude is not selfish, and we are ready to make sacrifices 
for it, if necessary. But for society all around us — for 
our nation — for the world — for ourselves, there are worse 
exposures than these. Remember Him who came to save 
the lost. Remember Him to learn compassion to the err- 
ing. Remember Him to know that from all things muta- 
ble and contingent, a true life educes good eternal. He 
who came to be to us the Resurrection and the Life, came 
also to be the Good Shepherd of souls. 



VIIL 

% toe $wt. 



Best is not quitting 

The busy career 
Rest is the fitting 

Of self to its sphere. 

'Tis the brook's motion 

Clear without strife, 
Fleeing to ocean 

After its life. 

Tis loving and Serving 

The Highest, and Best! 
Tis onwards ! unswervi"*, 

And that Is tree re»* 

Goethe. 

1 love my God, but with no love of mine, 

For I have none to give ; 
I love thee, Lord ; but all the love is thine, 

For by thy life, I live. 
I am as nothing, and rejoice to be 
Emptied and lost and swallowed up in thee. 

Madame Gotok. 



THE TRUE REST. 

After anxiety, we yearn for a season of peace, and glad- 
ly we turn from the wilderness of danger, to the shrine of 
true rest, with thanks to Grod that so many such shrines 
have stood along our pathway, and that we may, if we will, 
bear one with us in the ark of our Exodus. 

We are a restless and egotistical people, impatient of 
delay, and quite prone to glorify our own will, as if nothing 
could be impossible to a force that has already done so 
much. Perhaps it is precisely for this cause, that the 
words of great devotees sometimes have for us such sooth- 
ing power, and, weary of all this proud trust in ourselves 
we sigh for a rest better than the world and our own 
strength can give, and say from our own hearts in response 
to the great devotee's psalm : " My soul, wait thou only 
upon God ; for my expectation is from him." 

We consider now somewhat particularly the subject of 
mental quietude, as a practical blessing and power. We 



166 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

may have time to speak somewhat of its nature, its influ 
ence, and its direct claims upon our attention. 

Christian Quietude — the word recalls at once, to a 
scholar's mind, the noted controversies, in former times, 
between rival schools of theologians, who made the term 
Quietism, itself, the rallying cry of the most impassioned 
strifes. We will not try to revive that question, or show how 
Bossuet and Fenelon, with their illustrious followers, differed 
as to the precise degree of efficacy belonging respectively 
to the active and the passive states of the soul. The heart 
is essentially the same in all ages, and we may as well in- 
terpret it through our own experience, as by borrowing the 
costume of a former age. There is a yearning for rest 
within us, that often seizes us in the midst of our most en- 
grossing cares, and when our busy men say, as they often 
do, that they are looking to some calm rural home as a 
final retreat from care, they express a want which no 
change of abode can satisfy, and which cannot be fully 
satisfied, until the sonl finds her rest in a peace not of this 
world. 

What is Christian quietude ? It is not a mere nega- 
tion, surely ? a mere cessation of care and effort ? for this 
is indolence — one of the tempers most foreign from the 
Christian mind. The Psalmist speaks as if there were 
need, not of less, but of more earnestness, when he calls 
the noblest and deepest power of his being, his soul, to 
wait upon the Lord. The soul, that power which is in us, 
but which we little comprehend, and too little use, is thus^ 



THE TRUE REST. 167 

summoned to her high office, as servitor before the throne 
of God, as if there were a blessing which she only can 
win, and her service were none the less earnest, because 
with bowed head, and veiled face, she waits the will of her 
Lord. 

Such waiting is at once a check upon egotism and upon 
impatience, by showing that our will is not supreme, and 
even when suppliant before the supreme throne, it must be 
content to wait its appointed time. What rebuke there is 
in the language of true devotion, upon our too habitual 
egotism. We are apt to begin life, and allow our children 
to begin it, as if self were the centre and sovereign of the 
universe, and we had a right to complain, if we are disap- 
pointed by not having our own way. The better wisdom 
bids us take at once the waiting attitude, as if it were, 
from the beginning, a matter of course that our will is 
secondary, and God's will is to be awaited. Taking thir 
ground, the soul has the quietude of reverence, and her fit- 
ful fever is soothed by obedience to the eternal law, ami 
trust in the infinite love. 

So rebuking the spirit of egotism, the true quietude 
also rebukes the spirit of impatience. It bids man bide 
his time, as a creature in whose discipline delay is an es- 
sential element, and for whom God has decreed that the 
harvest of success shall not come at once with the blossom 
of desire. More than any other being, man must wait for 
what he wishes, for while the insect of a day tastes all the 
bliss of its little life whilst one sun is shining, man is 
doomed, as well as blessed, to an infinite domain, and what- 



168 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

ever his successes, his three-score and ten years find him 
waiting still for a good inexhaustible. Does his ambi- 
tion take merely a horizontal range, and measure success 
by the surface of lands or goods possessed, he must wait 
on time to enlarge the quantity of his possessions, for time 
is the great power in the market-place, and they are the 
wisest in their own generation, who await its developments 
most judiciously. Has he the nobler desire which meas- 
ures success, not by quantity, but by quality, and yearns 
for a higher and deeper mental and moral life, still he must 
wait, for wisdom comes not in a day, nor does the peace of 
G-od, without alloy or misgiving, reward a single work or 
prayer. This willingness to wait upon God's own time for 
the desirable measure of worldly success, and especially 
for growth in the moral and spiritual life, is a great source 
of quietude. 

Such, in brief, is the nature of Christian quietude — 
not indolent, but calling the soul to an earnest service, and 
subduing egotism into reverence, and soothing impatience 
into calm waiting. 

Mark now the practical power of this frame of mind, 
and we shall see that it is needed quite as much in our own 
every-day life, as in any devotee's seclusion — that, in fact, 
it is more imperatively necessary for a busy man, likely to 
fail of its control, than for a recluse, so ready to sink into 
its stillness. 

What power there is in the very act of waiting, or in 
the patient mind — power in controlling the faculties them- 



THE TRUE REST. 169 

selves, and in securing external results. When impatient, 
we are not our own master, and in our very eagerness for pow- 
er, we fret away the most efficient of all forces. Note the 
effect of a single fit of impatience upon the thoughts, when 
at some unexpected delay, or brief disappointment, we 
worry ourselves into a temporary fever, and for the time 
are beside ourselves. Carry out the same infirmity into 
the temper of a life, and how its health is broken, and its 
force languishes. For some spasmodic effort, there may 
be a convulsive struggle, that looks like energy without 
limit, but the result soon shows that the force is evanes- 
cent as convulsive, and it is not thus that the great work 
of our being is to be done. Nor is it thus that the best 
external results are to be secured. Our field of action is 
broad and long, and unless we can wait for some fruits to 
ripen, and the true hour to mature, we can neither have 
our best resources nor do our best work. As a dweller in 
time, man is called to be a patient waiter, and so his qui- 
etude is a power of mind and of achievement. 

Not merely in waiting, but in waiting upon God, there 
is power. The temper which subdues the petty pride of 
egotism, fixes surely the lowly strength of faith, which is 
mighty in the measure of its confidence, and says, " be- 
cause I am weak I am strong, and my strength is perfect- 
ed in weakness." We feel its force whether we contem- 
plate Grod as a sovereign ruling by laws, or as a spirit ask- 
ing our love and offering us his own. Are there laws over 
nature and over life, laws over the earth and over the 
body, laws over the unseen spheres and over our souls, 
8 



i 70 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

how can we hope to win true power over the realms with- 
out us, or the kingdom within us, except by learning these 
laws, and waiting for their forces to guide and crown our 
work ? In every step we wait the aid of the gravitation 
that holds the globe together, and in every book that we 
read, we wait on the laws of vision and memory to guide 
us to knowledge. The highest of all laws is the law of 
the spirit of life, which presents God to us as the infinite 
and eternal Mind calling us to personal communion with 
himself. How know God at all thus, and secure aught 
of the power that comes from such knowledge, except by 
waiting reverently upon his will ? It is high ; we cannot 
attain unto it, any more than scale the skies, or bring 
down the drops that sparkle in the rainbow, or catch the 
sun's glory in the clouds. Wait, reverently wait, and the 
heavenly grace will come to you. Your sharp, critical 
understanding, your self-sufficient will, your impulsive 
passions will not lift you to the mercy-seat, nor bring the 
heavenly mercy down. Wait with all the faculties of oui 
being, reverent and recipient, and God will not leave u> 
without a witness of himself. When we are hardest 
at work, let the will be still waiting for a power beyond 
its own ; when we are studying or meditating, let though 
crave a wisdom higher than itself ; when our affections ar 
earnest, and those dearest to us move our hearts most ten- 
derly, let human love wait upon the love that is divine, 
«ind so fill its vase of alabaster with a divine sweetness, 
that shall shed fragrance through all the house. Let 
work, and thought, and love, all thus breathe the spirit of 



THE TRUE REST. 171 

prayer, and the prayer which they favor shall return the 
favor with large increase, and hours of devotion shall be 
rich in influences over all the life. So my soul wait thou 
upon God, and let thy expectation be from him. 

Shall not the crowniDg blessing be a growing con- 
sciousness of communion with God, through the opening 
of all the faculties into the divine kingdom, and the union 
of our life-plan with the method of his Providence ? Do 
all that we can to discipline our minds wisely and arrange 
our affairs efficiently, we need after our method has been 
well fixed, to pervade the whole with a devout seeking 
spirit, just as if the whole were but the path in which we 
look for God's blessing to come, the Jacob's ladder on 
which good angels come and go. How far a perfect plan 
of life would bring a man's soul into direct communion 
with God, bringing to his mind a heavenly wisdom, to his 
affections a holy joy, and even transfiguring his body and 
his senses by a divine light and health, we will not pre- 
sume to say. But this we know that the best work and 
the best lives that the earth has seen, give us cheering 
glimpses of such communion, and prove that in his highest 
energy, man appears more as the recipient of a grace from 
on high, than as his own master and the sole arbiter of 
his own mind and deed. Even the most vulgar form of 
heroism, that of the battle field, proves that we need to 
be possessed by something beyond ourself to put forth 
our best energies ; and the soldier, as he goes into the 
fight, on fire with the martial enthusiasm, inspired by wa- 
ving banners, and sounding trumpets, and beating drums, 



172 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

gives some illustration of tho higher and calmer enthusi* 
asm of the true soldier of the cross, who fights to the last 
the good fight of faith, looking to a cloud of heavenly 
witnesses, and moved by the living witness within his own 
heart. The orator never speaks well until he is possessed 
by his subject, and his very tones show that the truth by 
which he would master the audience, has first mastered 
him. When earnestly pleading a worthy cause, what ma- 
jestic repose sometimes comes over him, as if he less 
poured forth the volume of words, than were borne along 
upon its swelling tide ; and some aged patriot's face which 
when unmoved seemed rough, and furrowed, and dim, is 
all lighted up with meaning, as when the seamed and peb- 
bly bed of a river is flooded by the rising waters, and the 
dark earth itself appears to flash into crystalline light. A 
true life is of itself the most sacred of words, and he 
who speaks it in deeds must needs be possessed by what 
he utters, and wait reverently on Grod for the spirit of 
truth. Hence the truest men, whether their sphere has 
been conspicuous or obscure, have always had a large 
leaven of quietude in their composition, and have trusted 
most even when they have dared the most. The most fin- 
ished culture herein meets the most unsophisticated piety, 
and the illustrious Fenelon, the very paragon of refine- 
ment and taste, consecrating an intellect of Grecian beau- 
ty by a faith of Christian tenderness, at once poet, states- 
man, moralist, theologian, orator, spoke of the light of 
G-od within the soul, very much like George Fox, the 
English farmer ; and the Archbishop of Cambray, in his> 



THE TRUE REST. 173 

purple, reasoned of holy quietude very much like the gra- 
zier of Leicestershire, in his suit of leather. The reason 
is obvious, for all who would find God's kingdom, must be 
like little children, and whatever their gifts, they must be 
willing for the crowning blessing to wait upon the Father 
of light and love. 

If these things are so, and Christian quietude thus 
gives the strength of patience, the peace of faitin, and the 
joy of conscious communion with God, is it not wvxi + o 
make more account of it in our plans of discipline and 
life ? Say for ourselves — " my soul, wait thou only upon 
God, for my expectation is from him." 

Let us be careful to silence all repining, to put down 
the fret and worry of mind that so often disturb our peace, 
and let us turn the soul thus freed from annoyance, in 
calm and earnest waiting upon the blessing of God. Even 
when we are sorely beset, even so perplexed with cares as 
hardly to know which way to turn, then still all complain- 
ing, and in the clear exercise of our reason wait serenely 
upon God to give us the light we need. He will not de- 
sert us, for he will not forsake the lowly, and to the up- 
right light shall arise in the midst of darkness. 

Let our general method of living partake of the same 
disposition, and aim to unite quietude with efficiency in 
every sphere. Let the household prove the worth of its 
union, and the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit crown 
its economy, and soothe its trials, and dignify its cares. 
Let children learn to be still in due season, and let pa- 



174 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

renta be their worthy teachers, by subduing their owe 
temper, as well as dealing in just precepts of obedience, 
Then the house shall be quiet without being dull, and a 
peace not of this world shall calm its labors, and deepen 
its affections, and interpret its destiny. Let the place of 
business, as far as it can, be regulated on the same princi- 
ples, in a true order, at once noiseless and efficient, like 
the mechanism that works all the better for the oil that 
stops its creaking. A man is surely more fitted for a post 
of great care by the most peaceful and self-controlled 
temper, and by it he saves a world of needless excitement, 
and concentrates all his forces upon his work in due me- 
thod. Nothing is gained by fretting and scolding in the 
house — nothing is gained by cursing and swearing under 
the irritations of business. In both spheres the true man 
or the true woman will yearn for a Christian quietude, and 
say — " my soul, wait thou only upon the Lord, for my 
expectation is from him." Well indeed is it in the midst 
of our cares, to wait upon him who holds all things under 
his care, and whose spirit is peace ineffable, keeping the 
worlds in motion without haste and without jar. 

Week by week God's own voice calls us to our rest 
*rom his church on our way. Should we not insist espe- 
cially upon the need of quiet waiting upon God, when we 
enter his sanctuary for meditation and prayer ? We go to 
church to listen to accustomed words from human lips in- 
deed, but these words are naught to us, unless we inter- 
pret them reverently, and make them means of self-exam- 
ination and worship. Common-place as this remark may* 



THE TRUE REST. 175 

be, how sadly we slight its truth, and rob the sanctuary of 
its due honor, by degrading it into a theatre of flippant 
criticism, or a resort of indolent formalism. Some of us 
probably are not only indifferent to the true spirit of wor- 
ship for ourselves, but are willing to intrude upon the just 
privileges of others, by disturbing the just quiet of the 
place after worship has commenced. We surely call it a 
mark of bad breeding to go to a dinner party some time 
after the appointed hour, and disturb the guests seated in 
their places, by the necessity of finding accommodations 
for us. Is it any less a discourtesy to come late to church, 
and interrupt the order of service, by the noise of our 
feet, and the bustle of our movements ? Nay, is it not 
adding irreverence to discourtesy, and breaking in upon 
the due quietude of the sanctuary, by negligence or indo- 
lence ? We ought to think of this seriously, and if each 
of us will look to our own ways properly, a great annoy- 
ance will cease, and new incentives to peaceful devotion 
will here be given. In the sanctuary let us be willing to 
bring our common remembrances, and needs, and aspira- 
tions, and differ as we may in our experience, let us wait 
on God for the blessing that we all alike do need — more 
of his light and peace, for more of the wisdom that can 
guide us through this perplexing world — more of the faith 
that can keep us true to heaven, in spite of all enticing 
pleasures and perplexing cares. The best mark of a 
Christian congregation is a certain serene earnestness, a 
certain aspect of the ministrations and the demeanor, 
which says beyond mistaking, that they who come together 



176 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

thus, seek a blessing above themselves or any human pow- 
er, and while they accept all available privileges of man's 
devising, they look beyond them to the giver of all good 
the Father of Spirits, for grace and peace. More of this 
spirit let us cherish, and new power as well as comfort 
will come from its holy quietude. An attraction deeper 
and stronger than we can well explain, will draw us to the 
house of prayer, and a still small voice will speak to us 
more nearly and benignly, as the years go on, and never 
desert us, though the earth quakes and the thunder rolls. 

With sacred constancy as the Sabbaths advance, let us 
reverently meditate upon the changes of human life, which 
must come even without our bidding, and which are well 
met only when calmly awaited. The greatest of these 
changes is of Glod's appointing, and if we wait on him 
truly here, we can without fear resign ourselves to his holy 
will. Then, my soul, wait thou upon God, for in life and 
death, and worlds to come, my expectation is from him. 
In drawing nearer him thou shalt better know thyself, and 
find thine own true life in finding his presence. 

Sitting thus devoutly at the foot of the cross, in the 
holy quietude of the sanctuary, we bear the blessing with 
us in our journey, and each bird of passage that we meet 
will tell us of the ark of rest, as well as of the wilds of 
our wandering. 



IX. 



" My Crown is in my Heart, not on my Head, 
Not decked with diamonds and Indian stones, 
Nor to be seen : my cr »j is called Content ; 
A Crown it is that seldom kings enjoy." 

Shakespeabe. 

"It is not perhaps much thuu ft <u ot, Dnt H *» certainly a very important les- 
son, to learn how to enjoy ordinary life, and to be able to relish your being with- 
out the transport of some Passion, or gratification of some Appetite. For want 
of this capacity, the world is filled with whetters, tipplers, cutters, sippers, and 
all the numerous train of those who, for want of thinking, are forced to be ever 
exercising their feeling or tasting." 

Steele, 



MIDDLE-AGE. 

Midway upon our journey, at high noon we now stand, 
with morning and evening looking at us from either 
side, and tempering with their cheerful retrospect and 
tranquil prospect the toil and heat of the day. The 
middle age of life is now our topic. It is a season too 
little spoken of either by the moralist or the preacher, 
each of whom apparently, in order to preserve the parallel 
between life and the year, notes only four seasons, and 
passes from childhood, youth, and manhood, at once to 
treat of Age. Strange, indeed, that the time more marked 
than any other by fulness of privilege and weight of duties 
and not without the gravest of perils, too, should be com 
paratively neglected ; as if life, instead of being a con- 
tinued and progressive history, were but an idle romance 
whose interest ceases as soon as the hero is married and 
established. After that, the burden and the heat of the 
day are to come, for surely the fourth and fifth decades are 



180 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

the very prime of our earthly being, and between thirty 
and fifty, our best work is likely to be done or neglected. 
If childhood is for unconscious development, and youth for 
conscious preparation, and manhood for beginning the 
world for oneself, middle-age or maturity is for preserving 
fidelity, and it must test the sanguine plan by efficient per- 
formance. Putting on the armor is one thing, but wear- 
ing it well is another thing, and it is the noonday of life 
that shows whether we wear it bravely or not. In view 
of the great work thus to be done, how natural the prayer 
of the Psalmist — " my God, take me not away in the 
midst of my days." The prayer has its deepest signifi- 
cance, when we implore God not only to take us not away 
from life itself, but also to take us not away from the use- 
fulness without which life is worse than death. 

Let us then, with all earnestness, consider Middle 
Age, its Experience, its true Temper, and just Progress. 

Maturity is especially to be marked as the season of 
experience, when the world must show most of its colors, 
and we must look at them with an eye somewhat disen- 
chanted of early illusions. Our doctrine on this point is 
simply thus : " Let us win experience without paying the 
sad price of worldliness, and let us learn to see things as 
they are, that we may do our part the better among the 
realities of our sphere." 

The whole of life, indeed, is experience, and we are 
always learning something from the cradle to the grave. 
Yet that knowledge is more worthy of the name which 



MIDDLE- AGE. 181 

conies when the passions have calmed their first fever, 
when the reflective powers have been awakened, and the 
main facts of the world have come upon us in all their 
reality. How eventful even in the most ordinary lot must 
this experience be ! Not without many cheering lessons 
•and privileges indeed, yet always in the case of generous 
minds, with a large alloy of disappointment and chagrin ! 
So many large expectations baffled, so many promises falsi- 
fied, so much empty profession, so much utter deceit, such 
vice in the garb of refinement, such hypocrisy under the 
cloak of religion — what man, who has reached the noon- 
tide of life, as he thinks of these things, does not smile 
bitterly as he compares the reality with the ideal of his 
early dreams ? Our experience of ourselves, too, is not all 
bright, for it shows us the difference between our aspira- 
tions and our deeds, and not unfrequently mocks very 
noble plans by very poor achievements ' T nay,, confounds- 
very generous sentiments by very feeble conduct. 

All too ready we are to call such experience of itself 
wisdom, instead of the stepping-stone of wisdom. Too 
ready we are to glide into the ways of the world, and give 
up what was best in our aspirations as the illusions of an 
untutored fancy. Here is one of the pressing dangers of 
mature years — the danger of utter worldliness at the very 
time when the world should be most effectually overcome. 
How many yield to it, who of us will presume to say ? 
Mark the altered tone of the man of the world at forty, as 
he makes light of what he calls his dreams at twenty. 
Note the change in the very expression of his countenance 



182 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

so vacated of light from above, and shining only with 
earthly prudence and desire. He may call his knowledge 
wisdom, but Heaven calls it folly. What folly so great as 
to doubt of virtue and to deny Grod, and treat life as a 
monstrous lie from beginning to end, or a mean expedient 
from first to last. 

Far otherwise the true man uses the experience of ma- 
ture years. The more he detects the world's cheats, the 
more he seeks the reality which it vainly counterfeits. 
The more he sees of heartlessness and deceit, the greater 
is his respect for the rectitude and kindness which are 
thrown by the contrast into such bold relief. The more 
clearly the saddest realities of life dawn upon him, the 
more determined is his purpose, and the more efficient his 
measures to guard against them, just as the brave pilot 
watches tide and wind, not to yield his vessel to them, but 
to guide it safely upon his own chosen course. Blessed is 
experience when so used ! when the knowledge of vice and 
misery gives strength to conscience and tenderness to com- 
passion, when acquaintance with the mighty energies en- 
listed in the world's cunning crafts lends enterprise and 
vigor to virtue, — when smooth-faced worldliness in its best 
success wakens the sense of a welfare beyond its gift. 
Blessed this experience more than all, when Grod's own 
hand is seen in the affairs of men, when his own grace i& 
felt in the heart, and the fatal taste of the tree of know- 
ledge is cured by the immortal fruit of the tree of life. 
Such experience makes one a man of God, not a man of 
the world. Sad is the noon of life without its coming-^- 



MIDDLE-AGE. 1 83 

happy, happier far even than the rosy morning, when noon 
is cheered by such trust, and the heart of faith beats 
more firmly than ever beneath all the realities of the 
world. 

Such experience cannot but act upon the temper, and 
we now speak of the temper most congenial with middle 
age. When in the midst of life, so balanced between ex- 
tremes, a certain equilibrium of character would seem ap- 
propriate. By his providential discipline, G-od calls us 
then peculiarly to an evenness of temper without monoto- 
ny, or in other words, to equanimity without indifference. 
In early life, something of impulsiveness and mutability 
may be expected, and the first enterprise and struggle of a 
noble manhood cannot reasonably be expected without 
some alternate chills and fevers of the blood. But in the 
midst of our days, God's providence calls us to a more 
equable frame of mind- He seeks to temper our wills to 
a just medium by experience of success and disappoint- 
ment, as the smith tempers iron by fire and water. He 
educates the judgment to some due sense of the average 
aspect of things, so that we are not to be cast down by a 
reverse, as if a passing cloud were a permanent eclipse, or 
made giddy by some new pleasure, as if a gleam of sun- 
shine were promise that darkness should be no more. He 
interprets to us the varied play of our own emotions, our 
glees and glooms, our elasticity and oppression, and so 
touches the many tones of this harp of a thousand strings 
that we may know pretty well its compass, and the tune 



184 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

and time of its notes. All this discipline should give ua 
Christian equanimity, and keep us far from worldly in- 
difference. 

Mark the distinction between Christian equanimity 
and worldly indifference. The man of the world, nay, the 
positively unprincipled man, may win by experience a cer- 
tain composure, and may look on the chances of life as 
calmly as the practical gamester watches the play of cards 
or dice. He may cater to his vilest passions on system, 
and follow the basest lusts with a deliberate method. Fear- 
ful, indeed, are the vices of mature years in their very de- 
liberation. A profligate of forty or fifty is a far more 
wretched and contemptible creature than a wild scape- 
grace of twenty, since he has used the very experience and 
discipline which should bring wisdom and sobriety, to min- 
ister to folly and shame. With all his keenness and com- 
posure, he will not escape retribution. He is playing with 
an awful power that is serious when it seems to jest, and 
he who makes of himself a whited sepulchre, cannot stop 
the work of moral corruption and death, by the fair out- 
side. When his course is smoothest, it may, like the river 
on the very verge of the cataract, be nearest the fall. 
Surely he who reasons most keenly on false premises, must 
one day come to the end of his reckoning, and figure him- 
self out a deliberate lie and sin. The composure of delib- 
erate vice is not equanimity, nor can we speak more favor- 
ably of the mercenary coldness that freezes the whole 
current of our being, and calls the icy death philosophic 
calmness. 



MIDDLE- AGE. 185 

No. Christian equanimity is the balance of all pow- 
ers, thoughts, affections, upon their true centre, which is 
Grod, and the fidelity which Grod approves. It is the har- 
mony of our whole being in its healthy action. Folly may 
mistake it for dulness, but wisdom sees in it the fulness 
of life. Its love is no wasting fever of the blood, but the 
healthy beating of a heart true to all worthy affections and 
duties — a love more deep, more true, yes, before Grod more 
lovely than any of the fitful impulses that set youthful pas- 
sions on fire. In the calm, loyal, considerate affection of a 
true home, tender without fitfulness, and constant without 
monotony, the human heart shows more of its divine rich- 
ness than in all the parade of passion that makes the staple 
of romances. So, too, in the steadfast fidelity with which 
the heads of a true family pursue the even tenor of their 
way, never swerving for a moment from their fixed aim, 
the best welfare of those committed to their charge, there 
is more true heroism than in all the protestations of disin- 
terestedness and the oaths of eternal friendship, that so 
dazzle the youthful imagination. Grod himself is the great 
exemplar of an even mind. He holds the mighty worlds 
in such noiseless equilibrium ; — He melts the prismatic 
colors into this sweet, uncolored sunshine, emblem of his 
own mind ; — He who combines all thought, all emotion, 
all power, sits serene upon his throne, gives his signet of 
quietude to his divinest messengers, and more than in wind 
or tempest or earthquake, speaks in the still, small voice 
of peace. 

learn of God equanimity without indifference — 



186 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

learn of Him, the Infinite Love, how to be even tempered 
without being unfeeling. Look up to the calm heavens ; 
to the marvellously balanced stars ; to the divine repose in 
the face of Jesus, and pray for the true spirit of maturity, 
— say, " my God, take me not away in the midst of my 
days, until I have learned it, and when I have learned it, 
let me live to breathe into others its surpassing peace." 

In its train comes progress, such as belongs to the noon 
of life — progress without instability. Too much of the 
boasted stability of many men comes from sheer obstinacy, 
and they escape the charge of fickleness, by not moving at 
all, except in a narrow and monotonous round, thus falling 
into a morose conservatism, as bad as reckless radicalism, 
and boasting of being finished because they have ceased to 
improve, like the English town which was called the most 
finished of any in the kingdom, because no house had been 
built there for a hundred years. The true man will shun 
instability, by having decided principles, which of them- 
selves commit him to generous progress, and because he is 
on a good substantial road, he will ever press on. 

It is one of the most cheering views of life, that we 
may always be improving, and especially cheering is it, 
when we are in the very midst of the gravest work of 
existence. This fact is not always seen, and a distinguished 
poet, in apologizing for the haste in which his autobiogra- 
phy hurries over the events of his life after the thirtieth 
year, the time of his marriage, says : " Comedies and ro- 
mances usually terminate with the marriage of the hero, 



MIDDLE-AGE. 



187 



and most biographies should also. The strange and event- 
ful period, the period of psychological development which 
makes a narrative entertaining, then chiefly ceases, and it 
is the contest and onward striving, not station and attain- 
ment, that most interest in communication." This princi- 
ple may do with romance readers, but not with sober stu- 
dents of the book of life. The thick of the battle comes 
at noonday, and if we are cowards then, the morning tri- 
umph but emphasizes our defeat. Great things indeed 
have been done in youth and manhood. Colburn con- 
founded the mathematicians at six, and Pascal was a phi- 
losopher at sixteen ; De Vega wrote plays at twelve, and 
Pope says of himself : 

" I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came." 

To take examples of more substantial power; Pitt was 
premier of England at twenty-four, and Napoleon was the 
conqueror of Italy at twenty-seven. Yet these are excep- 
tions, and the rule of life assigns its chief triumph to the 
meridian, or after the meridian. Even the greatest poets, 
whose imagination is supposed to be one of the illusions 
of youth, have borne their noblest fruit late in life. Dante 
began his immortal poem in the very meridian, and Milton 
won his place at the great Italian's side, when nearly three- 
. score ; and our chief moralists and statesmen have used 
their early years but as the basis of their noblest erections. 
Our Webster made his greatest speech at forty-eight, and 
ifter forty, our Channing began the campaign that gave 



188 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNE1. 

him his spotless fame. Measuring life by it moral worth 
we call that the most critical time for progress, which is 
to decide whether a man is to keep or break the promise 
of his starting, whether he cherishes to the end his best 
convictions, or is broken down by base lusts, or consumed 
by unholy ambition. True to his better genius, every man 
may expect, surely, deeper experience of religion, wider 
openings of spiritual life, as years ripen his sensibilities. 

Press forward ever — be ever a learner in the school 
of life — learn more clearly and deeply by what you al- 
ready know, and make the stern facts of the world, serve 
you as texts in the wisdom that is divine. Remember 
that in life, as in warfare, the shortcomings of the out- 
set, may be made up by a braver purpose in the sequel. 
Many a noble life is a Marengo, the defeats of the morning 
covered by the triumphs of the day, and cheered by some 
new purpose, even as those battered legions were cheered, 
by the advancing plumes that told them of the approach 
of their chief and his peerless guard. " The battle is 
completely lost," said the most courageous officer to his 
general, " but there is time to gain another." So Marengo 
was won. Improve not merely by reading and thinking, 
but by acting, and let action give point to books, and life 
add fire to thought. Improve not merely in your capital 
of knowledge, but also in your method of living. Look 
well to it, that your method leads you upward as well as 
onward, and with all your anxious striving, you lean more 
upon God, and bring his blessed Spirit to be the solace of 
your worn and weary will. Then noon will have a bless- 



MIDDLE- AGE. 189 

ing deeper than the spontaneous joy of the morning, and 
in firm experience, and calmed passions, and fixed habits, 
and devout aspirations, you will find that you have put 
your feet upon a path that God himself hath made for you 
'—even the way of the upright, that shineth more and 
more unto the perfect day. Somewhat for yourself in 
sense of such mercy, but more for others who lean upon 
you, you will say : " my God. take me not away in the 
midst of my days." 

Such is the burden of our thought concerning the mid- 
dle-age : 

Experience without worldliness. 

Equanimity without indifference. 

Progress without instability. 

The subject under consideration has interest for all — 
for the young, since their meridian is near, for the aged, 
since their meridian is a fresh remembrance — but for 
many, perhaps for most of us, because it is noon with us 
already. Our sun has climbed to the zenith, and will not 
change much until it sinks towards evening. Be it so. 
Blessed be God for this favored time of life. Let us hold 
stoutly on to all the good to which heaven has called us, 
and with brave, cheerful heart, work while it is day. It is 
high time for us to know, and make others know, on what 
ground we stand, and bear our open resolute testimony to 
every worthy principle and good institution. "We have no 
years to waste, no excuse for folly or vice now. In God's 
name press bravely on, and whenever the hour calls for 
fidelity, let not the man be wanting to his post. Instead 



190 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

of less heart, put more heart into our work, and with full 
experience, and calm judgment, and clear conscience, grasp 
the helm of our destiny. Instead of less faith, let us 
have more, more of Grod in our purpose and our trust 
Let truer, deeper life bring us nearer the Father, and so 
interpret, not so much for continued existence, as for purer 
living, the prayer for length of days, that we may serve in 
the noonday heat, the benign Master whom we hailed with 
our morning song. More than for the breath of life itself, 
strive for that spirit, without which, what we call our life, 
is but an animated death. 



X. 

Cloroft Rifo $in 



Night's sad cadence dies away 

On the yellow moonlit sea; 
The boatmer re?t their oars and say. 

" Miserere, J>iuiine I " 

Morn's glad chorus swells alway 

On the azure, sunlit sea 
The boatmen ply their oars and say, 

" Te laudamus, Domine ! " 

Coleridge, altered. 



CLOUD AND FIKE. 

The Mile Stones on our way seem to. come nearer to- 
gether now, and as we look back upon them in the distance, 
some that were wide apart when we passed them, come 
into almost the same line of perspective, so that the stone 
that was covered with summer vines and flowers, seems to 
stand by the side of the stone that was bared to our gaze 
by winter winds, or half covered by winter snows. What 
man of us who has passed the middle age needs to be told 
that life is full of vicissitudes, and that upon our journey, 
as upon the great Hebrew Exodus, the angels of G-od ap- 
pear sometimes in cloud, and sometimes in fire. 

That ancient story of the Hebrew wandering relates 
one of the chief facts in the history of the human race, 
and suggests thoughts for the guidance of every man's ca- 
reer. However much or little we may interpret the past 
through theological eyes, nay, looking merely from the 
secular historian's point of view, we must regard the Exo- 
dus of the Israelites, from Egypt to the promised land, as 
9 



194 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

one of the great events of civilization, and the law which 
they bore with them, we must consider as the groundwork 
of all ethics and jurisprudence. At present, we dismiss 
the historical relations of the event, and speak of its moral 
significance for each individual life. 

There is great moral beauty in the story of that forty 
years' march through the wilderness. No wonder that so 
many hymns, and prayers, and sermons, have for ages re- 
garded it as the most significant emblem of the journey of 
life. Poetry has illustrated, and not created, the expres- 
siveness of that simple narrative. Onward the great com- 
pany went, providentially guided through all their devious 
wanderings. Their sanguine hope was sobered by a hal- 
lowed memory, as, seeking a new home, they bore with 
them the bones of their great ancestor, and so their future 
was consecrated by their past. By day, the cloud guided 
their march, by night, the pillar of fire. Interpret these 
images wisely, and the Exodus of Israel becomes a lesson 
for us all when we think of 

The Cloud by Day ; 

The Fire by Night; 

And the Sacred Relics borne through Cloud and Fire 
homeward still. 

The Cloud by day ! In the bright daytime — the hours 
auspicious and hopeful — would we walk wisely, we are not 
to roll the eyes in giddy rapture over the broad landscape 
and the blue sky, but look rather for the cloud that offers 
its warniDg or its promise. There is wisdom and peace in" 



CLOUD AND FIRE. 195 

the disposition that takes this view, and tempers hope with 
caution in the bright hour. Miracle apart, the dark spot 
in the horizon, generally marks something of importance for 
our guidance, and the little sailor of tne air, that bears in 
its bosom the wind or the rain, has greater practical sig- 
nificance than all the fields of transparent azure through 
which it floats. Is it not so with human life ? When all 
things go well with us, and it is bright day, may we not 
wisely look round for signs of some darker visitant than 
the flashing sunbeam — think soberly of the omen of our 
exposure or disappointment, the monitor of our danger and 
our duty ? So thinks the good pilot always, whatever be 
his ship or sea. The sagacious statesman so regards his 
own position, thinks less of the crowds that dog his steps 
and shout his name, than of the wily foes who would 
thwart his plans, or the foolish friends who might cajole 
him into folly. The great leaders of nations, from the day 
of Moses to that of Washington, have known how to see 
and follow the teachings of the guiding cloud. Never 
beguiled into ignorance or presumption by success, sobered 
by the honors that make weaker heads drunk, they have 
heard the warning before the danger came, and the pillar 
of cloud has been the angel of their deliverance. 

The man of business reads the same lesson in his pecu- 
liar province, and cautiously watches the skies, which to 
the thoughtless, promise only blessing. He studies the 
doubtful fortune of trade, and looks for the cloud, when, 
to less observant eyes, the whole horizon is flooded with 
golden light. 



196 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

The Christian moralist, taught by the study of history 
and observation of mankind, never parts company with this 
same caution. For himself, and for others, he never will be 
thrown off his guard by appearances of prosperity without 
bound, or of virtue beyond fear. The watchman's trum- 
pet he keeps ready for its uses, and the very tones that 
speak the " All's Well," carry vigilant warning in their 
sound. But why single out specific classes of persons ? 
"Who is there whose experience is not full of such teach- 
ing? whose life is not deeply marked by passages that 
teach the wisdom and the necessity of looking well to the 
cloud, and making a guide of what might else be a judg- 
ment ? The significant thing that we need most generally 
to observe, stands in contrast with the horizon at large, 
and tells us of trials to come. When we think that we are 
doing well, there is some hint for us to do better, even to 
make that well secure, and to prevent the giddy successes 
of to-day, from becoming the bitter disappointments of to- 
morrow. 

A just self-discipline will make this truth a part of our 
habitual thought for ourselves aDd our children. It is 
harder to think soberly for our children than for ourselves, 
so much do we enjoy making them happy, and so strongly 
do we desire to protect them, even from the thought of 
trials. But the best kindness seeks for them an honest 
discipline, for life as it is and must be. It is unkind to 
blind them to the truth of things — unkind not to teach 
them the lesson of the cloud-pillar — not to train them to 
see divine leadings in the shades, as well as the lights of" 



CLOUD AND FIRE. 197 

human life. It is well to make childhood and youth hap- 
py, but its present happiness is rather fretted away, than 
secured, by constant indulgence, and certainly future years 
of care and exposure cannot but be the worse for expecta- 
tions wholly extravagant, and energies wholly unschooled. 
' Let children learn early to see that their will is neither 
Grod's law, nor the world's, nor the household's. Let them 
learn to own the divine uses of self-denial, discipline, the 
subjection of impulses to principle, of clamorous desires to 
well-considered good. Let the very air which they breathe, 
be laden with the spirit of faith and patience. Let the 
love, that beams upon them in its thoughtful cheerfulness, 
express the true character of the life opening upon them, 
and so shade hope with wisdom. Is it not well, nay, es- 
sential, to educate children in view of either extreme of 
fortune ? to prepare them for self-reliance,, however many 
their friends, or brilliant their prospects? Wretched, 
surely, the policy that makes affluence the occasion for en- 
feebling the energies, just as if high privileges did not 
rather increase, than lessen, the demand for the best pow- 
ers. The son, however fair his prospect of wealth and 
friends, is poorly off, if he cannot use fortune wisely, and 
bear reverses bravely. The daughter, however radiant in 
beauty or grace, however protected against want, is the no- 
bler woman from being schooled in the utilities and the 
temper, that can dignify reduced fortune by self-reliance, 
or adorn a brilliant position by good sense and energy. 
Let the annals of courts and commerce within our own 
times, impress upon us the worth of an education which is 



198 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

adequate to either lot, and which, in the brightest day, 
looks warily towards the cloud-pillar, and accepts God's 
hand in its guidance. 

But is not this teaching a gloomy philosophy, to insist 
on caution when present prospects are bright, and to speak 
of the cloud, when the sunshine seems a sufficient guide ? 
Not gloomy, but the reverse, for this philosophy gives the 
most cheerful view of divine providence, and calls out the 
most elastic energies of man. It brings God's love to bear 
upon our perils, and invigorates the soul when most tempt- 
ed to slumber away its force in false security. It gives 
depth to our happiness, and drives despair from our adver- 
sities. He who learns caution, when courage is tempted to 
be presumption, will the more abound in courage, when 
caution is tempted to become cowardice. Sobered into pru- 
dence by the pillar of cloud, he is all the more ready for 
fortitude, when night brings the pillar of fire. In short, 
the very spirit that takes from pleasure its giddiness, takes 
from trouble its frequent despair. 

So think of the Pillar of Fire, whenever we need its 
light in darkness, as we all must do. Every day little 
vexations come, and in every life great griefs appear 
There are probably times in every one's experience, when 
the burden is too great; apparently, to be borne, and relief 
would be hailed as a mercy, if Heaven should take life 
itself away with the pressure. Such seasons, whatever 
their circumstances, leave their mark, and it is well, if 
they sign their cross upon us in blessing. Little blessing 



CLOUD AND FIRE. 199 

comes, if grief brings despair instead of resignation. We 
sometimes hear people speak of being discouraged, and 
with tones and looks in keeping with their words. There 
is no such word in the Christian vocabulary, and the sad- 
dest psalm or prophecy, ends ever in jubilee or blessing. 
The very essence of faith, to say nothing of hope and 
charity, forbids despair. We may indeed, and often must, 
abandon particular plans, and be baffled in important un- 
dertakings. Yet even these should show us something en- 
couraging, either in themselves, or their lessons. Life is 
always a militant estate, and to use defeats well is as im- 
portant as to follow up victories. Every true man's diary, 
reveals Heaven's mercy in many an apparent discomfiture, 
and when read with the commentary of 'years, the record 
proves that a defeat may be a true victory, the spur of an 
energy not to be put down, or the incentive of a devotion, 
winning peace and power from humility. 

Certainly we owe much of what is best in our expe- 
rience to the true use of seasons that have seemed pecu- 
liarly hard, and which interpret the night of our own Exo- 
dus by the pillar of fire. Every man has trying times in 
his business or profession, and is much the better or worse, 
as he bears them well or ill. Every home has its days of 
tribulation, and the relations of its members depend much 
upon their use of the ordeal, for their union or estrangement 
must needs connect itself closely with the result. The 
critical periods of history have been times of trial, and the 
leaders of science, freedom, faith, virtue, have been those 



200 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

who have followed the fiery pillar through a night that has 
filled feebler hearts with despair. 

All mental and moral conflicts especially illustrate this 
truth. Speak not merely of the militant heroes of Chris- 
tian history, but of our own ordinary stature of experience. 
Our religion, or what we ought to call such — the sum total 
of our thoughts, feelings and purposes, regarding God and 
his providence ; does not whatever is deepest in it come 
most fitly under the emblem of the cross, that chosen sym- 
bol of peace through conflict ? Many a man not fond of 
using theological terms, and not technically called reli- 
gious, can tell from his own experience, that God's love 
comes to cheer him as he strives well through darkness and 
struggle. In every Pilgrim's Progress, the Valley of Hu- 
miliation is on the road to the Delectable Mountains. 
Some there are, indeed, who break down at that passage, 
and sink into despondency when they should be cheered by 
humility into new faith and hope. Be of good cheer al- 
ways, the Divine voice says. There will be some light to 
guide us out of the shadowy valley, and God's providence 
does not war with his creative hand by denying the hope 
native to the human heart. God has put into our natures 
a spring of courage, as also a spring of caution, and life is 
arranged so as to call ever for the action of both. 

As Creator, and as Redeemer, too, he calls for all our 
courage. The courage, which is a natural instinct, he 
would confirm by heavenly grace. Surely Christ came to 
quicken this power anew by renewing the affections* that 
make a man brave, and revealing the aims that make the^ 



CLOUD AND FIRE. 20 

prospect always cheering. His own Gospel, Heaven's love 
in his life, so fully incarnated, was the fire-pillar in a dark 
night, and its warmth and light have not ceased to bless 
us. In some way good will come ; believe it — the light 
will shine on our path as shall seem best to God, and be 
best for us, if not always as we may desire. Within the 
mind surely, and in the outward condition, the good angel 
shall come. When has it been otherwise to a true seeker ? 
What lesson is taught more decidedly by the best expe- 
rience than the wisdom, as well as the power of a hope that 
never fails ? 

So life should interpret the old Exodus, and hold up 
to us the pillar of fire by night, as the cloud by day ; thus 
rebuking the poor frivolity which swings to and fro be- 
tween gloom and glee ; thus illustrating the reasonable 
equanimity taught by our blessed Exemplar in word and 



Cautious, courageous by fire and cloud, onward still 
from bondage to promise, — bearing with them Relics of 
sacred Remembrance, the company divinely guided went 
on in hope. Dwell a moment upon this last image pre- 
sented — memory, not the enemy, but the friend of hope. 

With us, as in that eventful march, one treasure can 
never be left behind, unless we are utterly heartless and 
ungrateful — one treasure that need not be shut up in any 
funeral urn, nor appear in visible form — the treasure of 
sacred remembrance — the memory of wisdom or goodness 
passed away — a trust a3 hallowed as was the dust of their 



202 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

great ancestor to the Hebrew heroes in their march. In a 
man so strong and resolute as Moses, how interesting this 
spirit of tender retrospection appears in view of his in- 
domitable enterprise. The great lawgiver, in presence of 
the remains of Joseph, and bearing with the ark of promise 
the urn of remembrance ! Fact virtually renewed always 
when a right mind meditates upon the tombs of the faith- 
ful. Wisdom does not lead us to borrow any creed of de- 
spair from the dust of heroes, or the ruins of empires. 
Whatever has been well done, teaches even in its crum- 
bling monuments the worth of well doing ; and a true heart 
gathers treasures ever increasing from the riches of memo- 
ry. What in fact is mightier as a progressive force, than 
the influence of the wise and earnest men who have lived 
for their race and their God? What is the Christian 
Church itself, but the great companionship that keep sacred 
the Divine Master's memory, and unite remembrance and 
hope in a life reverent and progressive ? Forward for ages, 
that great company has journeyed, cautious and coura- 
geous, as cloud and fire have been witnesses of Grod's pres- 
ence in light and darkness, bearing with them the mystical 
body of Christ, and pausing at stages in the march to com- 
mune with the spirit of Him who died that men might 
live. In all its solemnity, what power and peace there is 
in this commemoration ! It brings near to us the heart of 
Christ, and connects with his death and rising all the loved 
and lost who have trusted in his name. Such remem- 
brance, instead of leading us to languid and indolent 



CLOUD AND FIRE. 203 

reverie, gives a high companionship, refreshing and quick- 
ening the soul for striving and progress. 

More and more, I must confess it, the Communion ser- 
vice has beauty and meaning. More and more it allies 
with itself whatever has been best in experience, and what- 
ever is most blessed in hope. More and more it is en- 
riched as enlarged studies interpret the good minds of the 
Church universal, and as our own life deepens its own pe- 
culiar revelations. How much of our wisdom, strength 
and inspiration, comes from remembrance ? The sages 
and benefactors of our race who have blessed us by their 
eloquence and heroism — the companions who have cheered 
our homes and friendly circles by their kindness and fideli- 
ty — who can part with these treasures without renouncing 
his birthright and forsaking God, the giver of such good ? 
Sometimes in our career, regret is so bitter and over- 
whelming, as to make us pause and shrink from further 
toils and cares, now that so much of the joy of life has been 
taken away. Who has not sometimes been ready to say, 
with the classic poet, in view of some sad bereavement, 
" Alas, how much happier to remember thee than to con- 
verse with others." But heavenly mercy teaches us a 
truer spirit, and turns mournful memory into a cheerful 
hope. Consecrated by Christ, remembrance is the hand- 
maid of progress, and the light that shines over its trea- 
sured dust, cheers the faith to the land of promise. 

How wonderfully, even in merely earthly limitations, 
God enlarges his promises as life goes on, and kindles new 
interest even from the wreck of fond hopes ! Study the 



204 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

plan of Providence ; and how full of benignity it appears^ 
as each season and age brings out its peculiar hope. Within 
and above all lesser promises, the great hope rises supreme, 
and has its august manifestation in Him whose life was the 
light of men. 

Before us, Beloved of the Father, be thy spirit and 
truth, shading our gladness with sacred thought — cheering 
our grief with blessed faith, joining in one precious union 
all worthy memories with the remembrance of thyself! 
The years are pushing us forward without asking our con- 
sent, and startling us ever with the sight or the story of 
changes. We hardly can recognize how we ourselves are 
changing, until perhaps some sudden shock strikes those 
next us, or when we are led to compare our present self 
with the self of some time long past. We look at an old 
picture or friend long absent, or revisit some old home- 
stead, and in some face or tree or building, we find a 
tongue to tell us how rapidly we are passing on and away. 
So let it be ! G-od does this for us, and not we ourselves ; 
the change is well, unless marred or hurried by our sin. 
So let it be with us, as with our fathers ! Onward still ; 
whether by cloud or by fire, follow the living God, and in 
our smiles and our tears raise the old psalm of blessing to 
Him whose mercy endureth for ever. 

" Weep, O my soul ! yet in weeping be still ; 

Not like the worldling's wild sorrow be thine ; 
Even thy tears flow at God's holy will : 
Weep then, my soul, but in weeping be still, 
Weep as seems good to thy Father Divine. 



CLOUD AND FIRE. 205 

" Smile, my soul ! but in smiling be still, 

Not like the scorner's proud smile shall be thine : 

Even thy joys wait on God's holy will. 

Smile, then, my soul, but in smiling be still, 
Smile as seems good to thy Father Divine. 

" Smiles, tears, He appoints, we strive to be still ; 

Storms rage, and for peace in vain do we pine : 
Yet moves on triumphant his mighty will. 
Thou too, O my soul, at last shall be still, 

Still in thy home with thy Father Divine." 



XL 



(Bin &t. 



" As I approve of a Youth, that has something of the Old Man in him, so I am 
no less pleased with an Old Man, that has something of the Youth. 1 ' 

Cicero. 

Depart awhile, each thought of care, 

Be earthly things forgotten all ; 
And speak, my soul, thy vesper prayer, 

Obedient to that wred call. 
For hark ! the peaung chorus swells; 

Devotion chants the hymn of praise, 
And now of joy and hope it tells, 

Till fainting on the ear, it says — 

Gloria tibi Domine, 

Domine, Domine. 

Lyea Catholioa. 



OLD AGE. 

When evening comes, and dim shadows gather over the 
earth, we look gladly to our homes, in whose cheerful light 
and friendly faces we see the whole day reflected, and find 
new and serener comfort given. Happy is the evening 
whose light is brightened by the face of some guest who 
has been the tried and loyal friend of years, and whose 
presence is at once a charming remembrance and a radiant 
hope. So was it with the two disciples on the day of the: 
resurrection, when, in their walk to Emmaus, they invited 
their mysterious companion home with them, and found 
their risen Lord revealed to them in the guest of their 
frugal table. Rich and sacred lesson, to guide our thoughts 
upon the Evening of Life. As our Sun sinks from its me- 
ridian, and the shadows fall more heavily, and labor pauses 
in its task, what comfort and power is there in the pres- 
ence of the most tender and constant friend, of Him sent 
by the Father to keep us ever in his love ! He walks in 
darkness who walks without God in the day of life, and 



210 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

in double darkness, unless, as the day declines, he wind 
him to still nearer companionship, and so repeats the in- 
vitation — " Abide with us, for it is toward evening, and 
the day is far spent." 

Here is our subject in this paper — the evening of life 
— its true Light, Peace, and Power, a subject coming 
home most seriously to us all ; for although few of us may 
rank among the aged, all of us, however young and sport- 
ive, make a sad mistake, if we forget that the sins of youth 
are visited upon age, and that a true life is of itself the 
only good art of winning a happy age. "We would treat 
this subject cheerfully, more cheerfully, perhaps, than any 
other, for each season is of G-od's making ; he who made 
the evening and the morning called them both good, and 
surely nothing on earth is fairer than a peaceful, spiritual 
old age. 

Consider first its true light, or the proper wisdom 
which should come with age. Of course it is no time 
then to begin to be wise, for if the true light has never 
shined upon a man's pathway before, it will not be likely 
to shine upon him merely because the world's light is 
waning. Use life well, study its facts, employ its oppor- 
tunities, shun its temptations, meet its dangers, appreciate 
its blessings, as they come, and it will not fail to teach 
heavenly wisdom. Of worldly prudence we are not speak- 
ing now, for this generally comes of itself, without respect 
to fidelity or character, and the worn-out profligate of 
threescore can commend self-control as the best expedient^ 



OLD AGE. 211 

and the broken-down defaulter can praise honesty as the 
best policy. Not of worldly prudence, well as it may be 
in its place, but of that higher wisdom we are speaking, 
which finds a divine purpose in our existence, and studies 
experience by the light of God. We need this always, 
but especially in age, when our life becomes like a book 
of remembrance, and memory is a garrulous babbler, unless 
her facts are ranked in true order, and led forward to the 
music of cheerful hope. The life of a faithful man is a 
Scripture written by the hand of God, and to be interpret- 
ed only by God's own love. All its labors and perplexi- 
ties, all its pleasures and triumphs have a meaning in 
themselves, and as parts of a providential whole. We 
are wise as we discern this meaning. Glimmers of it we 
may have all along our career, but when we pass the fifth 
decade, and enter the last score of the allotted term of 
usual age, we are sadly in the dark without its shining. 
Then most of our earthly experience is a remembrance, 
and we are benighted, unless we can carry with us from 
the past a light that does not fade. 

In the walk to Emmaus, Jesus interpreted to the two 
disciples those Scriptures which recorded at once the his- 
tory and the hopes of their race, and made the past shin 
upon the present and future. Their hearts burned within 
them as they listened, for he told them that their own 
lives touched directly the great plan of Providence, and 
He who came to be the Light of the World, had been the 
light of their life. Blessed revelation, not confined to 
them alone, not limited solely to the Jewish books thus 



212 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

unfolded ! Abide with us, Messenger of Heaven, Incar- 
nate "Word, and open the book of our lives, and show how 
Chronicle and Prophecy meet together there, and every 
ffliction has a lesson, and every remembrance a hope, and 
every labor a reward. Abide with us not as a stranger 
for the first time received, but as a familiar friend new 
welcome and interpret to us our experience, that we may 
interpret it to others ! 

Pleasant and profitable should be the talk at the even- 
ing of life ; and such it must be when the calm, cheerful, 
wisdom of the Master is its guide, and touched by him, 
every reminiscence opens some bright prospect, and the 
bread broken in his spirit quickens anew the sources of 
joy. How much we do need him to save us from the 
worldling's desolation, when he sees his boasted light fad- 
ing, and the world becoming to him " a banquet hall de- 
serted," with vacant seats for company, expiring lamps, 
and smouldering ashes, and empty cups for cheer. Even 
the shrewdest worldly prudence is a miserable solace, and 
the most successful man of the world, as he fights over his 
battles, or talks over his times and fortunes, is but a hol- 
low-hearted, benighted chatterer, unless a light from above 
shines upon his experience, and he has something of the 
spirit of him at whose word the hearts of the two disci- 
ples so burned as they walked to Emmaus. Such is the 
true wisdom for age, and they who would have it at even- 
ing, when other lights fail, must seek it at morn and 
noon, when other lights shine. 



OLD AGE. 213 

And how can it abide with us, without bringing cheer* 
fulness in its train ? There is no cheerfulness worth nam- 
ing, that does not spring from the light of God's love in 
the soul, and therefore our Saviour, who most manifests 
that love, is the most cheering of all companions for the 
evening of life. "We need his genial spirit always alike 
to give us patience in trial, and true joy in our blessings, 
for all our years, however youthful, call for some resigna- 
tion, and tempt us to some discontent. But when solemn 
monitors tell us that the daylight is fading, and our vigor 
lessening, and our labors must be lighter, and our familiar 
pleasures fewer, and the great night is not far distant, 
then especially do we need Christian cheerfulness to give 
us patience under the change, and to make a willing offer- 
ing of the exacted sacrifice. See God as Christ reveals 
him in the earlier seasons of life, and we shall not fail to 
see him during its closing years. He whom we sought 
as Guide, will stay with us as Comforter, and his glory 
will shine out at sunset even more blessedly than at noon- 
day. 

Our Saviour does not only teach us cheerful patience 
under the privations of age, but he enables us to win from 
them peculiar blessings, and make each loss open into a 
gain. With the gospel before us, with God's love and 
life's meaning so revealed, why mourn at the passing of 
years ? God has made every thing beautiful in his own 
season. Does the frame lose something of its elasticity, re- 
member that infirmity does not belong to age alone, and 
that temperate old age, in its moderated force, has a calm 



214 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

pulse and subdued strength most congenial with its quiet 
pursuits and reflective temper. Do the cares of business 
press so heavily as to call for young energies to come to 
the relief of overtasked age, remember that each season 
has its own appropriate work, and that age has in ripened 
judgment a full compensation for the decline of muscular 
vigor. Do what are usually counted as the pleasures of 
life fail the aged, remember that the purest pleasures cease 
only with rational life itself, and that in the gift of treas- 
ured remembrances and reflective wisdom, and moderated 
passions, and ripened faith, serene, deep enjoyment of na- 
ture, man, and God, age may have full recompense for all 
the fleeting joys of youth and manhood — more than recom- 
pense surely for the loss of all those pleasures which tempt 
excess more than they offer happiness. Is death near to 
age — so near as to give uncertainty to every hour, and 
thrust its spectral head into every scene ? Say, what 
season is free from death ? Remember that more, far 
more persons die young than old, and that death deals 
gently with the aged, alike in the manner of his approach 
and in the solaces which God has commissioned Christ to 
bear in that visitant's footsteps, that he may be the king 
of terrors no more, but the usher of the soul to the cher- 
ished company gone before. No. Mourn not over the passing 
years, but fill them with true affections and worthy works, 
and God will bless us even to the last. The interest of 
life will not cease ; and instead of doting petulance, 01 
what is quite as bad, shallow frivolity, a cheerful sense of 
God's love will go with us to the last, and open fresh com - 



OLD AGE. 215 

fort as the night shades come on. Even that charming 
sense of novelty which gives such zest to youthful curiosi- 
ty, will not cease ; for how can the knowledge of Grod and 
his providence be exhausted in our span of years ? Nay, 
the more we know, are we not earnest for still more, and 
does not a cheerful religious spirit enjoy the best attribute 
of genius itself, and see the universe as an ever new and 
ever opening revelation of divine wisdom and love ? Who 
will not seek the Father betimes in his chosen Messiah, 
and welcome anew the Divine guest as night draws near ? 
Abide with us, Christ, in thy holy joy, for it is toward 
evening, and the day is far spent. 

Need we say that such light and peace cannot come 
without bringing power with them ? "We need power at 
every season, yet never more than when bodily strength 
begins to fail. He who makes our strength according to 
our day, has not left the close of our day to helplessness. 
He is ready to give full balance for the force withdrawn 
by the new power granted. Piety, which is the safeguard 
of youth, is the old man's staff and stay. Let him lean up- 
on it, and he leans upon what is divine. Let him lean upon 
it with all his mind and heart, and his mind and heart 
will be strong enough to make up for the decline of mus- 
cular force. Resting upon Grod in all the maturity of the 
judgment, and all the calmness of confirmed experience, 
and with all the confidence of affections not bound to the 
earth, age rests upon the Rock of ages. The work to be 
done it cannot but do, and in some form of cheerful activi- 



216 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

ty, useful by advice, if not by continued labor — useful by 
peaceful example, if not by more obtrusive service, the 
aged man stands ever at bis post of duty, and awaits his 
Lord's bidding. 

Strong for action according to his vocation, he is strong 
in believing, and in that grace which comes to him through 
faith. Joy and crown of a true life — new childhood — 
second morning of our being, so exemplified in the expe- 
rience of the ripest men ! A return to youth, not merely 
by the strange renewal of young remembrances, but a re- 
generating of the affections, a renewal of that spontaneous 
trusting reason so beautiful in childhood ? Blessed old 
age, so entering the kingdom of heaven like a little child, 
and winning youth and childhood to itself by its holy wis- 
dom and loving counsel ! Nearer God than ever, it par- 
takes more largely of His grace, and all past experience 
and labor, all thoughts, affections, purposes, seem but to 
have been shaping the mind and heart into a vessel for 
holding the precious effluence from above. The disputing 
reason, the impulsive feelings, the daring will, all seem to 
kneel down then in faith before the mercy-seat, and be 
ennobled by the service and exalted by the obedience. 
Imagination itself, before so wayward and sometimes rebel- 
lious, becomes the servant of faith, and true to the Infinite 
Creator, joins him in creating the new heavens and the 
new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. The noblest 
genius ever seen on earth joins with the simplest piety in 
the invitation to God's Beloved — " Abide with us, for it 
is toward evening, and the day is far spent." The thinner 



OLD AGE. 217 

the veil of this earthly tabernacle, the more need of the 
light that can chow the Divine glory and the eternal world 
through its perishable material. 

What can be more practical and cogent than our pres- 
ent topic — Age and its Preparation ? Take it to your- 
selves, children and youth, for your parents' sake and your 
own. Deal gently and reverently with your elders, as you 
hope to be dealt with, if your years are as many. Begin 
to live not as for the present pleasure, but as for the term 
allotted by your Creator, and judge all your conduct by 
its bearing upon the whole. Do not waste your years in 
folly ; do not spend your strength on vanity ; do not, by 
exhausted health and perverted passions, sow in youth the 
seeds of a bitter harvest in age. " It is a most amazing 
thing," says the grave John Foster, " that young people 
never consider they shall grow old. I would say to young 
women, especially, renew the monition of anticipating every 
hour of the day." Exchanging his habitual solemnity al- 
most for jesting, he adds : " I wish we could make all the 
criers, watchmen, ballad-singers, and even parrots, repeat 
to them continually, you will be an old woman, you will, 
you will." We would not be so extreme as this, but sure- 
ly we must say to all youth, seek God in a sober wisdom, 
and cheerful temper, and devoted purpose in your day of 
strength, and he will bless you with his brighter presence 
when the evening comes. You, too, who are in the high 
noon of life, and too prone to measure your security by 
your gains, remember that gold is not Grod, and nothing is 
more melancholy than the grasping covetousness so habit- 
10 



218 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

ual to the old age of a life given to godless gains. Use 
your means and rule your care under the Master's gui- 
dance, and he will be your guest when your working-day 
ends. 

Some in my circle of readers allow a more direct ap- 
peal, for their evening is already coming on. Little favor- 
ed indeed would any circle or company be without such 
presence, and the charm of childhood itself is never com- 
plete, without some counterpart of venerable years. And 
art itself, as the interpreter of nature and of God, finds no 
completeness in its grouping, unless youth and age com- 
bine in the beauty of the scene. It is not well to think 
sadly that we are growing old, for such is our lot during 
our whole lifetime, and the man of sixty does not feel 
older than the youth of eighteen. Probably the truest 
life has least painful consciousness of age, and takes every 
season as a progressive blessing. Yet they who have en- 
tered their probably last score of years, have a work to do 
appropriate to their season, and right faithfully should 
they do it. Touching examples from classic and Christian 
sources urge the appeal. "What beauty in the group pre 
sented in Cicero's charming dialogue on Old Age, where 
he presents the venerable Cato, at more than fourscore, 
nstructing and delighting such brilliant young men as 
Scipio and Laelius, with his cheerful philosophy of living, 
and welcoming the day that shall take him from this 
earthly tumult to the great company of souls, and espe- 
cially to his dear son, as noble a man as was ever born. 
What higher beauty, when the sage's desire is strengthened 



OLD AGE. 219 

into the Christian's trust, as in home scenes that we all 
have known, and which make the old man's festival, at 
eighty, more beautiful than the play of rosy children, who 
gambol at his feet. Wisely let the elders interpret their 
years as a revelation from the Father — cheerfully let them 
bear their privations^ and use their privileges — piously let 
them lean upon the divine arm, and walk in peace towards 
the curtain that hangs before the dark valley, already quiv- 
ering as if to rise. He whom God sent to be their guide, 
has passed through that gloom. Let him not be a stran- 
ger. Elders, slight not your Saviour — slight not his dy- 
ing love — say now with new earnestness, and in response 
to every early impression of his gospel : " Abide with us, 
for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent." 

It is late autumn now with nature, as I am writing, 
and the leaves lie withering at our feet. It seems like au- 
tumn with mankind, and the tree of life itself has been 
dropping its fairest fruit and foliage, so treasured for years 
The earth stands now, as if at one of the evenings of her 
great day, and the night shadows were falling upon an en- 
tire age. Our fathers have fallen, and are falling. Can 
we not almost hear the muffled drum beat of a mighty na- 
tion, circling the world with her great soldier's funeral 
march, and keeping company with the word that our great 
civilian is no more ? It is evening now ; but instead of 
complaining, raise gently, joyfully, humbly, the Christian's 
vesper hymn, responsive to the matin song, and as the day- 
light dies, welcome anew the bringer of light uncreated 
and undying. Join, join our souls with the dying prayer 



220 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

of the mighty ! Say : " Abide with us, Beloved of the 
Father, for it is toward evening, and the day is far 
spent." 

" My heart doth feel that still He's near 
To meet the soul in hours like this, 
Else — why, why, that falling tear ! 

When all is peace, and love, and bliss! 
But hark ! tliat pealing chorus swells 

Anew its thrilling vesper strain, 
And still of joy and hope it tells, 
And bids creation chant again— 
Gloria tibi Domine! 



XII 



Dwsjwi »nJ> fytittwdL 



My Father's hope ! my childhood's dream ! 

The promise from on high 1 
Long waited for ! its glories beam 

Now when my death is nigh. 

Blest scene ! thrice welcome after toil- 
It' no deceit I view ; 

O might my lips but press the so". 
And prove the vision xvlq\ 

Its glorious heights, its wealthy plains, 

Its many tinted groves, 
Tbey call ! but He my steps restrains, 

Who chastens whom He loves. 

liZRX Apostolica. 



PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT. 

Every man is looking forward to some coming good, and 
a large part of his happiness is from anticipation. From 
the very outset of his journey, his eye is fascinated by 
some distant object, and no amount of disappointment is 
sufficient to rid him of the fascination. Nay, the loss of 
one fond prize, serves but to sharpen the desire for a 
fonder prize, and throw added enchantment over the dis- 
tance. God has ordained that it should be thus with us, 
and that by many an illusive chase, we shall strengthen 
our faculty of enjoying substantial good. "He," says 
Coleridge, " is the best physician in the treatment of ner 
vous diseases, who is the most ingenious inspirer of hope.' 
Our Creator then, is the greatest of physicians, for he is 
ever treating life's fitful fever, that chronic disease of man- 
kind, with the medicine of hope. Poor indeed is the man 
who enjoys only what he possesses, and has nothing to hope 
for. Says Shakspeare : — 



224 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

" True Hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings, 
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings." 

Let us be willing to bless this charmer, although we have 
so many times been deluded by the charm. 

The leader of the hosts of Israel, and the giver of their 
laws, had guided his people from the land of their captivi- 
ty to the land of promise ; and now, without being permit- 
ted to set foot upon the long sought Canaan, he was to die. 
He had freed them from the Egyptian yoke, led them safe- 
ly across the sea and the desert ; he had preserved them 
amidst the perils of famine, and disease, and the enemy, 
and from the far worse moral perils of discord and idola- 
try. Forty years he had sought to prepare them, by the 
hard ordeal in the wilderness, for their home in the happy 
land. He had tried to imbue them with reverence for the 
One Grod, the Grod of their fathers, and for the law given 
by his hand. Now, on the plains of Moab the hosts were 
encamped, the desert passed — the foe conquered. All 
was joy and hope. The tents of Israel, that had been 
borne through so many perils, and pitched in the desert, 
often among murderous tribes, were now spread in peace. 
On one side rose the mountains of Abarim — on the other 
side rolled the long looked for river. From the peaks of 
those mountains, the banks of that sacred stream were visi- 
ble, perhaps its waters could be seen gleaming in the light, 
like a screen of silver, between the wanderers and the land 
flowing with milk and honey : — 



PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT. 225 

" Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood 
Stand dressed in living green." 

Who should be so happy in all that host as their lead- 
er ? On the shores of the Red Sea, so safely crossed, his 
< joy was overflowing, and his voice and his sister Miriam's, 
had led the thanksgiving song of the redeemed nation : — 
" Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously, 
the horse and the rider he hath overthrown." Now a hap- 
pier day had come, and should not his strain be yet more 
joyful ? Were not the deserts, with their fires, and ser- 
pents, and more savage enemies, far behind ? and was not 
Canaan now in sight ? 

Far otherwise than joyful, was the lawgiver now. In 
much sadness he made the proclamation : " Hear, Israel, 
thou art to pass over Jordan this day." He knew the im- 
pulsive and superficial character of his people. Their past 
errors taught him their future dangers. He knew that 
prosperity was a harder trial than adversity, and that 
many who cross the desert in safety, find their ruin in gar- 
dens of peace and plenty. He knew that the day of tri- 
umph is ever a day of trial, and instead of gay festivals, 
he appoints a solemn meeting; instead of songs of jubilee, 
he utters serious counsel ; recalling the sober lessons of 
experience, he repeats the law with especial adaptations to 
their future position. He embodies in a poem his most 
important lessons, and intrusts it to the charge of the el- 
ders of the nation. It is a rebuke of the people's sins, 
yet a rebuke mingled with the heartiest encouragement — 
in* 



226 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

the whole breathing a sadness that would be overwhelming, 
were it not for the deep faith and hope that rise above the 
tones of mourning. This poem was the swan- song of the 
great prophet. His mountain-throne of triumph was his 
tomb. He died with a benediction upon his lips. It had 
been decreed : " Thou shalt see the land, but thou shalt 
not go thither." His eye, as it was closing, rested upon 
the tents of Israel in the plains beneath — on the sacred 
river and the promised land, which the Lord showed to 
him, from Grilead on the east, to Dan on the west — from 
northern Naphtali, to the south, and the plain of the val- 
ley of Jericho, the city of palm-trees. 

Thus died the man whom Grod had raised up to do a 
work, second only to that of Jesus Christ. His fate is 
that of all his race. He saw the land but was not permit- 
ted to go thither. No man, in this world, is to see the full 
result of his own labors. Each, whatever his success, 
must die with the land of promise only in sight. 

Learn now the lesson of the great lawgiver's history in 
its relation to things present and to come. 

Observe its application to the most obvious forms of 
human enterprise — the sphere of ordinary business. He 
who labors from morning to night to hoard up wealth, ne- 
ver finds his Canaan of content. He has been dreaming 
of the time, when care and fatigue shall be at an end, 
when wealth shall bring leisure, and leisure satisfaction. 
A land of promise has been ever before him. But when 
he approaches the long sought home of rest, new cares and' 



PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT. 227 

new labors rise before him. Long before the six-score 
years allotted the lawgiver, the stern decree that he must 
die finds him still toiling, still unsatisfied. He looks upon 
his cherished treasures, and knows that they are to pass 
into other hands. With sore misgiving, he questions the 
future : " What use shall be made of the goods which I 
have earned ? May not temptation lurk amidst the very 
bounty I bequeath ? " Happy indeed for him, if, in view 
of the Canaan opening, not to him, but to his children, he 
can be assured that from himself — alike from his word 
and example, a law of integrity and fidelity has gone forth 
which will be a safeguard through plenty as through pri- 
vation. Happy the parents, who having brought their 
children to a position of competence, leave them with a 
good education, a sound mind, and an earnest heart, that 
can make them equal to either fortune. No heritage, how- 
ever large, can be fatal, if the sense of responsibility be 
transmitted with the sense of privilege. No heritage can 
be small, that carries with it a noble remembrance, and an 
example of energy. Sad indeed the land of promise with- 
out such guidance — sad for those who are guides to its 
border, and for those who survive to enter into its do- 
main. 

The same principle may be applied to all those who 
have labored not solely for themselves and for their chil- 
dren, but for the future welfare of their country and their 
race ; to all the lights and leaders of our race, to the pa- 
triots who have striven for their nation and died before 



228 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

the hour of triumph, or lived to see new perils in the na- 
tional prosperity — to discoverers in art and science, who 
have met with envy and ill will from the very ignorance 
and prejudice which they would cure — to moralists and 
philanthropists who have found their "blessing returned by 
cursing from the vice which they would reform, and the 
darkness which they would enlighten — to teachers of pure 
religion, whether those who were sent originally to reveal 
the true Light to the world, or those who strove to revive 
its brightness in opposition to the despot who would 
darken, or the denier who would quench, its glory. Read 
history superficially, and as we meet with the names most 
honored, we say, " these men were successful ; they did 
their work and had their reward." Scan their lives more 
critically, and we find that they had not crossed the 
threshold of their hope, and the aureola that gilds their 
fame, has most of its radiance from the gratitude of pos- 
terity. 

Still farther we are ready to carry the idea of the text. 
The noblest kind of progress is that which is estimated by 
its kind rather than by its degree, and which looks to eleva- 
tion rather than to mere extent. Every right-minded per- 
son desires to grow up in true mental and moral stature 
He desires to be wise in the knowledge of himself and of 
Grod, and whatever Grod has made. We have all looked 
more or less earnestly, in our young enthusiasm or our 
mature sobriety, for a virtue untarnished by a fault, or a 
peace of mind untroubled by a doubt or fear. This is the 



PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT. 229 

upper land of promise. In this we cannot but believe, and 
towards it, unless we are utterly unfaithful, we must ever 
press. Do we find it ? 

We surely trample upon the gospel, unless we believe 
in perfection and happiness as the proper end and aim of 
the human soul. Nay, in a true mind, this faith is as in- 
destructible as faith in Grod's goodness. 

Perfection ! — we do not find it on earth. The best 
men have the clearest sense of their own deficiencies. The 
best workman sees most the incompleteness of his work. 
The greatest artist, whether poet, painter, orator, is least 
satisfied with his own production, and laments the vast 
distance between his aim and his doing — between his reali- 
ty and his idea. The wisest and most fervent Christian 
is humblest of men, is sure indeed that he is on the right 
road; yet counts himself, like Paul, not to have appre- 
hended or seized the mark, but to be still pressing on. 

Happiness ! — who finds it here below ? Yet the truest 
man believes in it more and more. Nay, seeks for it in a 
faith ever calmer as life is teaching him to distinguish be- 
tween the shows and the substance of things. His hope 
is no hectic fever of his soul, but it is the throb of its most 
healthful pulses. The leaders of humanity up the heights 
of the spiritual life have never despaired. Leaving to 
others the cheering lessons of their example, they have 
urged their followers to begin where they ended, and, pass- 
ing within the veil, they have trusted there to know things 
not seen by earthly vision. 

The topic that we have treated has decided connec- 



230 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

tions with the season of life now under consideration, and 
with the century in which we live. We are just passing 
beyond the summit of the nineteenth century, and are thus 
prompted to look behind and before. How can we help 
thinking of the many benefactors whose lives and labors 
have tended to make our own future, and that of our race, 
so auspicious. The men who begun this century at twen- 
ty years of age, are now over three-score and ten. Fifty 
years form a very significant portion of the individual's 
experience and the nation's history. It embraces the ac- 
tive period of a life extended to what is usually called the 
limit of age — the period from twenty to seventy. They 
who at the opening of the century were just coming upon 
the stage of affairs, are now passing away. A land of pe- 
culiar promise was before them. The new generation, then 
just reaching their majority, were led in this country to- 
wards a future by one whose name may, in some respects, 
be connected with that of Moses, and who died just as our 
century began. Our Washington was their leader, and he 
did not live long enough to realize the greatness of the 
heritage which his fortitude and wisdom did so much to 
win for others. Chief of his country's armies in the wars 
of liberty, in time of peace, firm guardian of her laws, he 
saw the nation freed from the foreign yoke, and subject to 
a civil order based upon the convictions of the people. 
The duties of the soldier and magistrate faithfully dis- 
charged, he sought repose in his peaceful home. But the 
quiet shades of Vernon proved as the hill of Abarim. 
Rumors of wars disturbed his retirement, and when the 



PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT. 231 

peril of war was over, faction clouded his horizon, and the 
last hours of the great patriot were not without anxiety as 
to the solution of the momentous problem of free institu- 
tions. Constitutional liberty was the theme of his anxiety 
and his prayers. He looked to the land, but was not per- 
mitted to go thither into its fairest regions. His people 
were to cross the river and enter a realm of untried plenty. 
He was not to go with them, and Vernon was the Pisgah 
upon which our lawgiver died. And now the generation 
that followed him is passing away. Eventful indeed has 
been their history — not ignoble their work. Who in the 
most general way would undertake to tell the lessons of 
the last fifty-four years, without overflowing gratitude to 
the Ruler of events for the men raised up to be our bene- 
factors ? Calm reflection now should check the violence 
of party prejudice, and recognize the hand of Providence 
in each of the two great lines of influence that have shaped 
our national destiny. How large is our heritage through 
the labor and enterprise of the statesmen, pioneers, naviga- 
tors, inventors, orators, poets, moralists, divines, who have 
conspired to bless the nation and the home ? The old 
world has not withheld its bounty, and its leading minds 
are now a portion of our inheritance. 

One by one, our guides and guardians have been pass- 
ing away — some of them lamented by the millions — some 
of them known only to the little circle whom they have be- 
friended, and by those blessed in their death with a bene- 
diction as worthy in the sight- of Heaven, as if pageants 



232 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

and marble spoke to the world of their honor. Who is 
there among us who will not now cherish tender thoughts 
of the benefactors who have led us to this hill of vision 
and who have gone, or are going, from our side ? 

Fair, indeed, the future before us — fairer, perhaps, and 
more exciting than any ever before promised to mankind. 
What is to come of it — of all this working of powerful 
principles, of liberty, order, education, in connection with 
those mighty material agencies, which human invention 
has bestowed upon man ? A half century to come, like 
that which has lately passed, to what will it bring us ? 
The imagination asks no fictitious theme, but reels in 
wonder before the omens of simple truth. Sober history 
is enthusiastic prophecy. 

Yet be quieted, our souls. Pass on cheerfully, reso- 
lutely, but still expect no exemption from the universal 
lot. Who of us can reasonably expect to realize what we 
have promised to ourselves in life ? We are all engaged 
in some pursuit which we hope will lead to peace and com- 
fort. Many work hard with head or hand, or both, in the 
hope of one day living at ease, free from the imperious 
command to toil. But, believe it, we shall never find the 
promised land of leisure or contentment. We must in 
some way strive as long as we live, whether compelled by 
necessity or by desire. Many look to future riches, towards 
which they have been travelling through a forty years 
wilderness of privation and fatigue. The pleasant region 
seems near at hand. The desert is passed, there rolls the 
long-sought river, and beyond, the fields smile with plenty. 



PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT. 233 

" Joy, joy, is the cry. Let us enter into rest. Let us 
and our children cross the waters and revel in plenty." 
But no. Thou shalt not go over, nor enter the land flow- 
ing with milk and honey, where pleasure comes, and not 
care. You shall have care and anxiety to your dying day, 
quite as much anxiety in keeping and using your gains, as 
in winning them. You shall die as upon Abarim, on the 
verge still of a promising future, and your joy in the 
prospect will not be without misgivings as to the lot of 
those who come after you, lest their triumphs may have 
more peril than your trials. 

Yet nevertheless press cheerfully on and do our part 
faithfully. We are debtors enough to the past to be cred- 
itors to the future. Grateful for all that has been done 
to bless us, we repay the obligation by benefits to those 
who come after us. For our own individual souls, we are 
shaping a boundless hereafter. Let this fact teach us the 
coherence of all time, whilst we take heed lest any narrow 
notions of individual isolation may lead us to repudiate 
our relations to our neighbor or our race. Our home and 
kindred — our community, our church, our nation, nay all 
humanity has a future connected in some measure with 
our own. Let the memory of those who have blessed us, 
guide us in view of 'things to come. 

The world to come ! Thither a greater than Moses 
is the guide of the faithful. He who died on Calvary 
opened to his followers a new earthly future, which he did 
not enter. He is the great interpreter of all earthly hope 



234 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

— the solace of disappointment, the consecration of suc- 
cess. He offers not indeed to stay the flight of time, or 
give every fair prospect its earthly fulfilment. The Ca- 
naan that he opens is the realm in which he with the Fa- 
ther dwells. Honor to all them who have enlarged the 
surface of human life, and been the leaders of humanity 
in its onward march. Grlory unto the Eternal Father for 
the gift of him who came to open the depths of the spir- 
itual world, and whose swan-song was not like the ancient 
lawgivers, and did not treat of earthly conquests and 
fears, but was a prayer of immortal trust, a call to heav- 
enly mansions. Let each dying year be soothed by his 
word, and let its requiem speak of the hope that does not 
die. The land of promise is never found, because the 
soul's true home is not on earth, and all our seeking, as it 
is true, serves but to lead faith towards the unseen and 
eternal world. The true ideal is not a dreamy fancy, or 
ever-wandering plan, but it rests upon a spiritual faith. 
From that world came the archetypes of all things fair on 
earth — to that world all true hope and effort lead. By 
our disappointment and our success, it is the part of wis- 
dom to learn at once patient waiting and filial trust. Hu- 
man life is not a master delusion. Jesus our guide, the 
gravest experience responds to the most enthusiastic 
youthful confidence. Thus the noblest of aged men of our 
time have passed away. The Holy Spirit has put the new 
song of the redeemed into their hearts, and the disap- 
pointments of past life seem but as the withered blossoms 
which fall that the fruit may ripen. 



xin. 



Into the Silent Land ! 

Ah ! who shall lead us thither ? 

Clouds in the evening sky more darkly gather, 

And shattered wrecks lie thicker on the strand ! 

Who leads us with a jw'ie hand, 

Whither, O whither, 

Into the Silent Land? 

O Land 1 O Lana 

For all the broken -hearted, 

The mildest herald by our fate allotted, 

Beckons, and with inverted torch doth stand, 

To lead us with a gentle hand 

Into the land of the great departed, 

Into the Silent Land 1 

Von Sams. Translated by Longfellow. 



DEATH. 

At the tombstone we now stand, that last way-mark of 
our earthly life. There standing we read the words of 
gospel faith, from that apostle who was snatched from the 
darkness of Pharisaic prejudice by him who is the Resur- 
rection and the Life : " death, where is thy sting ? 
grave, where is thy victory ? " These are the words not 
of a dying man, excitable by overwrought nerves, or en- 
raptured by delirious visions. They come from a man in 
the fulness of active life, and the very master-spirit of the 
greatest enterprise ever undertaken on earth, an enterprise 
that struck at the empire of the world. Nothing can be 
more practical, nay more business-like in its bearing than 
this letter of the apostle Paul to the church at Corinth, 
that metropolis of commerce between the East and the 
West — that New York of old, in which the merchandise, 
the people, the manners and creeds of all nations com- 
bined their pride and their misery. Advising them how 



238 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

to settle their disputes, remove their scandals and adjust 
their church offices and affairs, the apostle rises in tone as 
he proceeds, and closes with those sublime passages on the 
paramount worth of charity, and the truth of the immor- 
tal life, which reach their climax in the words just quoted. 
Here, as everywhere, the truly practical man shows him- 
self to be the fervent spiritualist, and in the midst of his 
labors contemplating death and eternity, not to disparage, 
but to cheer his work. 

Let such a spirit guide us now in our meditation upon 
death in its practical bearing. "We have been considering 
the Circle of Life, and now in a few papers upon the close 
of life and the future state, we are but completing the 
theme. Now our topic is Death. 

Death as a fact Natural and Providential; as demanding 
preparation, general and special; as to be met soberly 
and hopefully when it comes. 

In common with many theologians, even of opposite 
creeds, we regard death as an event quite in the order of 
Nature and Providence — not in itself, but only in its in- 
cidental fears and penalties, as an extraordinary arrange- 
ment for the punishment of mankind. Our race were ev- 
idently born to die, and the very structure of the body, 
the increase of population, and the relation of human life 
to outward circumstances, compel us to believe that, from 
the very first, man was not intended in his bodily organi- 
zation to be an exception to the usual course of nature. 
The coal that burns so cheerfully in our grate, bears marks 



DEATH. 239 

of wood and foliage that died years before man was crea- 
ted; and the stones of our houses, often embed shells 
whose tenants breathed out their life before earth was 
eady for man's dwelling. When he came, there is no 
proof either in reason or revelation, that he was to escape 
the universal lot of decay. It was decreed that he should 
die if he sinned, but this dying was, we believe, not nat- 
ural death, but a spiritual decline, such as sin ever brings 
and salvation removes. The death which Jesus came to 
do away, was not the ceasing of bodily life, since Chris- 
tians must die as surely as other men, but it was that de- 
cline of faith and love which deadens the soul to Grod and 
immortality. Taking the Christian view, we are to accept 
death as a fact of nature, and by a right spirit make it 
also a fact of Providence which reveals the will of God, 
as well as the laws of matter. 

The physiologist has his place in the investigation of 
this great change, and has much to tell us of the phenom- 
enon of life and death. Yet he can go very little into 
the deeps of the subject, and whilst the race of shallow 
materialists pretend to hunt out the mystery of our being 
on the point of the dissecting knife, the true man of sci- 
ence calls their philosophy empty chattering, and stills his 
voice into devout silence, as he contemplates this wonder- 
ful structure tenanted or untenanted by its soul. The 
' higher it ascends in the scale of being, the more devoutly 
does science look above material laws to an overruling 
mind, and see a Providence within and above nature. 
The Christian begins where science ends, and interprets 



240 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

the facts of nature by the mind of the Creator. If with- 
out Grod's will not even a sparrow falleth to the ground, 
surely without his will no rational creature dies, and death 
so intertwines itself with the uses of life, and with the 
whole economy of the universe, that we must consider it 
eminently as a providential as well as a natural fact. 

As we cross the threshold of the subject, then, be 
ready to regard this great change as among the ordained 
events of our being, and instead of shrinking from it as 
from a sentence of execution passed upon us in Grod's an- 
ger, on account of original sin, let us accept it as part of 
his benign plan from the very beginning. " death, 
where is thy sting ? " Not in the fact of death itself, but 
in the fact of sin, the only fatal sting is found, for by this 
sting the soul's peace is poisoned, and her vision is dark- 
ened to the light of God and heaven. 

If death be thus one of the ordained facts of Nature 
and Providence, it is reasonable to prepare for it upon the 
same principles as for any other great change or transition. 
Each season of life has its beginning and close ; nay each 
year is born at its beginning, and dies at its ending, so 
that every thoughtful man conducts his affairs in view of 
his yearly account. He not only endeavors to manage 
his business upon judicious principles in general, but he 
has also an eye to rounding off the concerns of the year in 
particular, that the past may be without remorse and the 
future without fear. Now our earthly life itself is but a 
great year in our existence, and the change that comes at- 



DEATH. 241 

its close, is but one of a series of changes which begin 
with our birth. Prepare then for death, as we prepare for 
every great transition, as we prepare in youth for man- 
hood, or in manhood for age, by a life true to every obli- 
gation and duly mindful of the change to come. 

This principle rebukes at once the superstition that 
regards preparation for death as something ghostly or 
magical, wholly apart from true living, and the philosoph- 
ical indifference that is content to set death down as but 
one among the fatalities of nature, about which we are to 
give ourselves no concern, because we cannot help them. 
Strangely the superstition still haunts the world, that the 
service of God is something separate from practical recti- 
tude, and that actual usefulness is no preparation for 
meeting Him at last. " Prepare to meet thy God," is a 
command that should be heard not merely in books of de- 
votion, and chambers of sickness, and sanctuaries of faith, 
but in all the active scenes of life, in our places of busi- 
ness and enjoyment, in our pleasant home and quiet med- 
itations. " Prepare to meet thy God,' by the faithful 
use of every power and opportunity intrusted to you. See 
God's signature on every faculty of our mind, and every 
day of our existence, and do not defraud him of the rea- 
sonable service due from what is his own. Say not that 
it throws a gloom over life to have this service constantly 
in view, for we cannot use life for its true worth, unless 
we interpret its meaning through its Creator's will ; and 
our best happiness as our just responsibility is of his or- 
daining. The recollection will many a time rebuke our 
11 



242 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

worldliness, and spur our sluggishness, but should it not 
far more frequently cheer away our despondency, and re- 
new our strength, to he assured that we are called to serve 
Him who is so merciful to every infirmity, and so encour- 
aging to every effort as our Father in Heaven ? Remem- 
ber that under his kingdom all fidelity is true service, and 
worthy living is preparation for worthy dying. 

And yet however purely and devotedly a man may try 
to live, death is a change so peculiar and so solemn, as to 
call for some preparation peculiar to itself. No man can 
be so conscious of rectitude as not to feel a decided need of 
forgiveness, or so clear in his spiritual vision, as to have 
no desire for an assurance better than his own thoughts. 
In various modes this need has been supplied, and by the 
gospel only has it been fully supplied. Law of true life, 
the gospel is also the true preparation for death. In Jesus 
Christ it brings Grod's love so near that the soul may cling 
to it in faith, with full assurance of pardon, and in him 
the immortal life is so revealed, as to be no more an opin- 
ion but a fact. The sting of death is sin, and the strength 
of sin is the law. He who took away the rigid law, and 
breathed the spirit of life in its stead, and brought im- 
mortality to light, has taken away that sting. Know Jesus 
and trust in him ; follow him in his mission and in his 
cross, by the practice of his charity, and in the worship 
of his church ; and then we find that his gospel is work- 
ing into our whole mind and heart a power able to over- 
come the grave. He sadly neglects his duty and interest, 
who overlooks this fact. We call him an unjust man who 



DEATH. 243 

lives so unmindful of dissolution, as to make no just pro- 
vision for those to whom he owes property or protection, 
and it is one of the essential duties of an honorable citi- 
zen, to leave his affairs in such a state that his family and 
neighbors shall not needlessly suffer by his death. Does 
I the duty end with care for worldly goods, and is it not every 
man's solemn obligation to think as much of Grod's testa- 
ment for his soul, as of his own will and testament for his 
property? Central in the providential plan of Grod, 
stands the mission of Jesus, as the mediator between the 
visible and the invisible worlds. Ceniral in that mission 
stands his death of sacrificial love, and as central in his 
gospel and his church, stands the command to keep that 
death in remembrance. Remember Christ loyally, if we 
would share the peculiar comfort which his death imparts, 
and every approach to the table of communion shall be,, 
far more than you may be conscious of it at the time, a 
season of preparation for the last hour. Without gloom, 
without any sepulchral chills, the spirit of the Master will 
come near to you in blessing, and if you receive him wor- 
thily, his peace will follow you through every trial. "We 
cannot have too much philosophy, yet we need more than 
philosophy, we need the gospel with its grace, to give 
life beyond theory, and a victory over death. 

Draw still nearer the solemn subject, and consider the 
very presence of death, that time when the word comes to 
us, " This night or this day, thy soul will be required of 
thee." How should we ask and strive to meet that hour? 



244 MILE STONES JN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

Much of its circumstance must be wholly beyond our con» 
trol. In an hour that we think not, the Son of Man com- 
eth, and the time and the mode of our dissolution are not 
set down in any horoscope that we can read. Yet gener- 
ally men may have warning when their time has come, and 
they always should have warning when friends can give it, 
that the last hour may not be lost to charity and faith. 
Surely as civilization becomes Christian, and deeds of 
violence cease, death approaches with gentler step, and 
sends more reliable word of his coming. The views and 
habits that we usually cherish, will in great part decide 
our temper and bearing in his presence, and in this as in 
every emergency, the true character will be likely to show 
itself. If it is not always true, that the ruling passion is 
strong in death, and the brave are sometimes timid, and 
the timid are sometimes brave in the last conflict, it is 
true that the ruling principle may be expected then to 
show itself when disguises fail. It is not best to insist 
much upon the importance of appearing well, since if it 
is well with the soul the bearing cannot be otherwise. Yet 
there is a natural self-respect, which may justly move a 
man to give honorable testimony of his convictions, and 
fold his mantle in peace around him as he falls. The noble 
wishes to die with a dignity worthy his name, and the same 
instinct appears in the poorest laborer. Old Siward, the 
Northumbrian, cried out from his death-bed to be clothed 
in mail, and armed with his sword and battle-axe, that he 
might die like a brave soldier ; and we have accounts from 
the survivors of the English war ship Centaur, that many 



DEATH. 245 

of the crew who had labored incessantly during days of 
cruel suspense, attired themselves in their best clothes, 
when assured that the sea must be their grave. Apollo- 
dorus carried to Socrates a cloak and tunic of fine wool 
for his dying dress, and Mary of Scotland, and Charles 
of England, went to the scaffold in their stateliest array. 
Such externals a Christian man may think little of, yet he 
will not be indifferent what witness he leaves behind him 
as he goes from the world. I have known a circle of 
friends who formed themselves into a society to pray for a 
happy death, but no such narrow society is needed, since 
every true prayer spoken or unspoken has the same aim, 
and every church is virtually such a circle. 

In all simplicity and truth, in all tenderness and wis- 
dom, we should pray to meet the last hour. Away with 
the hard stoicism that is ashamed of every natural sensi- 
bility — away with the ghostly cant that presumes to scorn 
this earth which God has made, and to hurry the approach 
of the fatal messenger. Let the soul be wholly honest 
and true at the last hour of its earthly witness. While 
life lasts, it is not without great blessings to every sane 
mind. We read that during the prevalence of a malig- 
nant fever, a venerable minister found an old man sick 
with the disease in a subterranean stable among rags, 
without any other furniture than two saws and a hatchet, 
which he could no longer wield. " Courage, my friend," 
said the priest ; " God is about to show you favor to-day, 
for you will leave a world where you have known nothing 
but troubles." "What troubles?" answered the dying 



246 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

man, with feeble voice. " You are mistaken ; I have lived 
very content, nor have I ever complained of my lot. Glod 
be praised for having given me life, and for closing my 
days, that I may join him. I feel the moment — it has 
come, father, adieu ! " Let us, who are so much more fa- 
vored, be not less grateful. Be not afraid to say, that 
there is much in this life worth living for, and that the 
eye is to close upon blessed privileges, precious friends, 
glorious works of G-od and man. Let the regret not sink 
into repining at the good we leave, but rather rise into 
gratitude that we have enjoyed it so long. Let life come 
before us in solemn review, and all its mercies unite their 
testimony in praise of that sovereign love that has watched 
over us, and is to watch over us still. 

In that love we can, if we will, be strong, and strength- 
en others. It is our only dependence then, for however 
wise or affectionate our friends may be, they cannot go 
with us where we then are going, and there will be a sad 
sense of loneliness and desertion, if we cannot lean upon 
one who can and will go with us, and will make the dark 
valley light with the glory of his presence. Humbly, yet 
earnestly, in lowly confidence rest upon the everlasting 
arm — contemplate Jesus as he was on earth, and as he is 
ow with God — seek the Father in him, and him in the 
Father, and our dying whisper may swell with its feeble 
breath the strain that in every age has repeated the apos 
tie's jubilee : " Thanks be unto Grod, who giveth us the 
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 

The experience of mankind is after all a secret histo- 



DEATH. 247 

ry, and every day's sunshine falls upon scenes of faith and 
sacrifice that the world knows not of. The great emer- 
gencies of nations do but call out reserved powers, always 
alive in obscurer scenes. How touching is that passage 
of the Reign of Terror, when the sisters of a religious 
house went to their death calmly, singing praises to God, 
and the hymn became fainter, not sadder, as each voice 
was silenced by the axe, until the Superior alone contin- 
ued the strain, and the infuriated mob were awed by her 
tone whilst it lasted, and appalled by its pausing, when the 
slaughter was complete. Yet without the magic of such 
common sympathy, and the inspiration of such historic 
heroism, many a lonely sufferer lifts the voice of praise 
and prayer as bravely as that army of martyrs, and as ac- 
ceptably to God. Every hour multitudes are passing 
away, whose last thoughts are not for themselves, but for 
those whom God has committed to their charge. This 
parting, and not physical pain, gives death a sting to the 
Christian. Probably most persons suffer far more many 
times during life, than in the pains of dissolution. Hun- 
ter, the celebrated physician, so long observant of others, 
turned to a friend during his own dissolution, and said : 
1 If I had strength to hold a pen, I would write how easy 
and how pleasing a thing it is to die." Not pain of body, 
but of mind, may be the sting of death to a soul whose 
sin is forgiven, and to whom life has ties all the closer, 
because of the love cherished, and the sacrifice made. In 
a way that we know not, God can take away the sting, and 
his goodness, which suits its ministry to each season of 



248 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

our being, will not leave us desolate at the last hour. In 
Him put our trust. 

Thus we meditate upon death as a fact, as an event to 
be prepared for, and as a trial to be met. It implies a 
morbid state of mind always to be haunted by its pres- 
ence, and to have our pleasure dashed, and our enterprise 
enfeebled by its spectral vision. Yet it is equally morbid 
to try to shut out the thought, and to live as if this world 
were all. Let death teach us wisdom, and give us peace 
and power too. Let it show the pleasures and cares of 
the world in their true proportions, and rebuke our vain 
strifes and anxieties. Let it calm all the fever of our 
passions, by the promise of its rest, and stir the best en- 
ergies of our being by its limit to our labor, and its crown 
to our fidelity. 

Learn to live as if we were to die, and we shall die as 
if we were to live the life eternal. 



XIV 

Immortality n Jart 



44 In legitimacy of conclusion, strong and unexceptionable is the argument from 
Universality of belief, for the continuance of our personal being after death. 
The Bull-calf butts with smooth and unarmed brow. Throughout animated Na- 
ture, of each characteristic organ and faculty there exists a pre-assurance, an in- 
stinctive and practical anticipation ; and no pre-assurance common to a whole spe- 
cies, does in any instance prove delusive." 

COLEBIDGE. 

44 And lo ! above the dews of night 
The vesper star appears 
So faith lights up the mourner's heart, 
Whose eyes are dim with tears. 

44 Night falls, but soon the morning light 
Its glories shall restore ; 
And thus the eyes that sleep in death 
Shall wake to close no more." 

W. B. 0. Peabody. 



IMMOKTALITY AS FACT. 

Our life, whilst we are on earth, is of itself a fact far 
greater than any of our opinions about it ; and every 
thoughtful man, as he reflects upon his own experience and 
consciousness, upon what he has felt and thought and done, 
is more and more convinced that his being is, after all, 
a mystery constantly surprising him with its developments. 
We have been surveying the Circle of Life from birth to 
the grave ; and has not the feeling been growing within us 
that each season brings with it a revelation of ourselves, 
of that interior self which we can never exhaust, and 
which passes our understanding, however much we may 
try to understand it ? So striking has this truth been to 
some of the chief thinkers of our race, that they have sup- 
posed our whole life to be but a remembrance of a pre-ex- 
istent state, and that all our new notions are but the old 
ideas revived. Wiser far it is to interpret the progressive 
development of our being here as promise of more perfect 
development hereafter, and to regard the fact of the pres- 



252 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

ent life as no less mysterious than the fact of futurity. 
Who will review his own career, and say that it is more 
strange that he should live hereafter, than it is that he has 
lived here ? Does not our whole existence in its successive 
stages tend forward still, and does not the hope that lights 
the grave begin at the cradle, and gather brightness as the 
years increase ? 

Of the Future Life, we treat in this meditation : — 
the Fact, the Form of the Fact, the Appreciation of the 
Fact. 

The Fact of the Future Life — how do we prove it, by 
what class of evidence or method of argument ? Every 
thinking man has many a time exercised his mind upon 
the subject ; and our philosophers, from Pythagoras down- 
ward, have been piling up volumes of high discourse on 
the immortality of the soul. Yet who of us does not see, 
that the fact is far deeper than all reasoning about it, and 
that its roots are not touched by the critic's pruning-knife 
or the logician's spade ? The fact is part of the organic 
being, and the providential training of the human race, 
standing among those first truths which have their best 
evidences in themselves. Try to prove it logically, and 
still the best proof is better than our logic ; try to dis- 
prove it logically, and our chain of reasoning refutes itself 
when touched by living experience, as the iron rod which 
man lifts against heaven, becomes a conductor for the 
divine spark. 

More or less clearly the truth of immortality has al- 



IMMORTALITY AS FACT. 253 

ways been held by man, and the peculiarity of the Chris- 
tian religion was not so much in stating it as an abstract 
idea, as in bringing it into full light and true life. The 
fact of Christianity itself is therefore the fact of the im- 
mortal life, since Christianity accepts all the light of Na- 
ture, and concentrates all other proof in its own divine 
witness. Does any one ask, how Jesus proves the doc- 
trine of immortality, and to what class of evidence we 
assign most value, the evidence of miracle, or of reasoning, 
or of inspiration ? we reply that we can make no such dis- 
tinctions, that Christianity is to us a living whole in Christ 
himself, and the gospel is in every part the glad tidings of 
eternal life, as truly as .there is clearness in every part of 
a diamond, and attraction in every fragment of a magnet. 
To Jesus Christ it was given to present our humanity in 
its perfect state and true destiny. In him the soul has 
its true consciousness of God and immortality. His own 
life, in such communion with the Father, was and is the 
living proof of the gospel. He spake with authority, and 
not as a scribe. Go to him as he asks us to do, and we 
learn of him the fact of eternal life. That life was in him 
a conscious possession, and it went out in all his words 
aid works ; was sealed by his death, and crowned by his 
rising body and the descending Paraclete. I will never 
attempt to prove the future state from the gospel, until I 
attempt to prove that the sun is bright, or that the blos- 
soms of spring are promise of the fruits of autumn. I 
accept Christianity as the central fact of God's providence ; 
and instead of trying its doctrine of futurity by less evi- 



254 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

dence, I would use the greater to confirm the less, and re- 
joice to see every deep yearning of the soul and every 
generous aspiration of the mind, and every sacred les- 
son of nature so met and fulfilled in him, who is the Resur- 
rection and the Life. 

Sit at the feet of the great teacher, and straightway all 
other worthy teaching becomes luminous. The analogies 
of nature, interpreted by him, illustrate Grod's plan for 
the soul's welfare, and up the ascending scale of natural 
transformations we trace the way to the spiritual world. 
The metaphysical argument from the very being of the 
spirit has new force, when by the Word of Christ that 
spirit comes into clearer consciousness, and experience be- 
comes the heart of reasoning. The moral argument drawn 
from the survey of life as a discipline under Divine Provi- 
dence, and requiring retributions here and hereafter, is 
taken by him out of the region of speculation, and speaks 
as with the trumpet of judgment in every serious Chris- 
tian conscience. So in the fact of Christianity, all other 
evidences of the fact of immortality have their consumma- 
tion ; and the life of Christ, whenever truly discerned, is 
the light of men. 

In him the Father's purposes shine forth as clearly as 
does the perfection of our humanity. He is the living 
proof, that Gi-od has created at least one order of beings to 
receive his favor and to glorify his goodness, not solely 
within the limits of earthly existence, but through life 
eternal. So in Christ, the mind of Gi-od and the needs of 
mankind, combine their testimony to the fact of futurity,. 



IMMORTALITY AS FACT. 255 

The question now comes as to the form of the fact, 
Paul stated well what all have asked or thought, when he 
said, " How are the dead raised up, and with what body do 
they come ? " The answer may be satisfactory without being 
specific upon every point, since even in the near realities 
of this present world, we are not allowed to see precisely 
the form of the future until it comes, and every man's for- 
tune and mental development show results that are a sur- 
prise to himself. As we do not presume to know all about 
our appearance and destiny hereafter on earth, we cannot 
expect to know all about the future of the soul and its po- 
sition hereafter. Enough, however, we may know to 
silence denial, and to confirm faith by rational anticipa- 
tions as to the two chief points — the future person of man, 
and the sphere of his existence, or the spiritual being and 
home. 

All existence of which we have any knowledge has 
some form ; and G-od himself, although his essence is in- 
finite, and therefore indefinable, manifests himself through 
the various forms of creation, and especially through his 
Son. He made man in his own image, and gave the 
human body a form corresponding with the faculties of the 
mind. What form the soul within us has to the All-dis- 
cerning eye, we cannot say, without claiming his attri- 
butes ; but we have reason to believe that it has either 
some form, or the capacity of developing such. There is a 
natural body and a spiritual body, says the apostle, and 
the sages of the world have said the same. Why not fol- 
low at once the Word of Inspiration and the hint of na« 



256 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

ture, and believe that the soul bears the germ of the spintr 
ual body, which, after death, is to be developed in accord- 
ance with the nature of its faculties, and the elements of 
its future sphere, by the power of Grod ? Accept this view, 
and we shun two extreme errors ; we are saved from the 
pantheism which asserts immortality only in name, and de- 
stroys all personal identity by merging man's being in 
God's infinitude ; we are saved also from the materialism 
that knows no future existence apart from this present 
bodily fabric, and places all hope of immortality solely 
upon the resurrection of the body. So man is secure of 
personality without sinking into materialism, and has hope 
of a future that shall continue his conscious existence 
without continuing his physical limitations. The form of 
the spiritual body is a subject fairly within the domain of 
philosophical analogy, but does not belong to the positive 
ground of Christian faith. 

The idea of continued personal existence raises the 
question, where — or what is the place of future abode ? 
"Where is the world of spirits ? That there is a world to 
us invisible, is as obvious as that there are beings to us 
invisible. G-od is every where, yet we do not see him. 
Christ and the spirits in fellowship with him, still live, 
yet we do not see their abode. Our Saviour, when on 
earth, had communion with heaven ; yet the everlasting 
gates were not revealed to the eye, nor was the undying 
anthem heard by the ear. Where then is the spiritual 
world ? It is quite enough to say, in answer to all infidel 
denials of a spiritual state, that we see but a small portion 



IMMORTALITY AS FACT. 257 

of the universe with our senses, and that the portion of it 
most important to us here, the domain of our thoughts and 
emotions, we perceive not by the senses, but by our con 
sciousness. The finer and more powerful elements of 
nature are least tangible ; and such forces as electricity, 
magnetism, and the odic current, are so subtile and mys- 
terious, as to seem transitional elements, between the ma- 
terial and the spiritual worlds. It is enough to disarm 
such gross infidelity to affirm that nature, instead of deny- 
ing, gives analogies in favor of a spiritual world, which 
must be the interior life of the universe, as the soul is the 
interior life of the body. 

This analogy has been developed with great fulness by 
various philosophical writers in all ages, and by none with 
so much system and persuasiveness as by Swedenborg. In 
him we see the universe exhibited as the external of the 
spiritual world, all the orbs of creation having their invisi- 
ble atmosphere of life, each having its own heaven, and 
Grod being the sun and centre of all. Isaac Taylor has 
comprehended all theories of the spiritual world within three 
classes. The first of these makes out the home of souls to 
be within the present visible world, upon some purer 
planets or central suns. The second regards the spiritua 
world as all around us, and pervading all existence, espe 
cially surrounding every orb. The third theory regards 
the home of the soul as to be provided by a transforma- 
tion of the visible universe into a more glorious creation, 
or by the end of this world, in order to the rise of a new 
creation, with new elements, and new and higher expres- 



258 MTLE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

sions of omnipotence and intelligence. These theories 
show possibilities, and may develope probabilities. How- 
ever wanting in positive proof either of them, or any com- 
bination of them may be, they present analogies for the 
service of faith, and show the folly as well as the sin of 
the godless view of the universe that denies the soul a 
lasting home in some mansions of the Heavenly Father. 

So then we speak of the form of the fact of the future 
state, affirming the continuance of personal consciousness 
with such organism as God may give, and in a sphere of 
being provided by him, and we leave the particulars alike 
of the spiritual body and the invisible world in the region 
of pious contemplation and scientific analogy. 

To bring the whole subject down from the abstract to 
the practical, let us now look at it for ourselves, and speak 
of our just appreciation of the fact of futurity ; not of the 
future state as a motive, for that will occupy a paper by 
itself, but of the way to make the fact a reality to us. If 
a man die, shall he live again ? In our creed, and with 
our best convictions, we say with more than the patriarch's 
light, yes, he shall live again; and sometimes to us, as 
worldly as we are, the unseen world is the reality, and this 
earth is but the shadow. But generally it is not so, and 
we live as if immortality were a fancy, and heaven a fond 
dream. How shall we rebuke such worldliness, and make 
futurity an ever-present fact ? 

How do it except by treating it as a fact in our con- 
duct, until it shall make itself a fact to us by its spirit ? 



IMMORTALITY AS FACT. 259 

Work and wait. As we work for the true aim, that aim 
shall be clearer ; and as we wait upon a heavenly power, 
that power shall draw ever nearer. 

Work as under the divine kingdom, and its reality will 
constantly grow upon us. Does not all faithful earthly 
'service illustrate the worth of religious obedience ? Upon 
the stormy ocean, with death upon the waves and mutiny 
in his fleet, Columbus was true to his noble queen, and her 
majestic smile was then as near to his sense as when he 
knelt before her a poor suppliant repelled in scorn from 
other courts. In dark times, with cold and famine in his 
camp, with murmuring among his countrymen, and the 
threat of a traitor's doom from the repudiated throne, our 
Washington kept his allegiance to his country, and her 
approving countenance was as clear to him as when he laid 
his sword at her feet, and took the oath of fidelity as the 
chief magistrate of her constitutional law. Even so in our 
relations to the Divine Sovereign and the spiritual world, 
every act of obedience fixes the attention, and clears the 
vision. Working for the life eternal quickens the faith 
which is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of 
things not seen. 

And the more we work, the more reverently we wait ; 
for much as we may do to make heaven near, we only put 
ourselves in a position to allow its spirit to approach us. 
We knock at the gate, that it may be opened to us. There 
is a life which we do not form, but which we can only re- 
ceive. That divine life was manifest in Christ in its ful- 
ness ; and its influence, through him and all means of 



260 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

grace, still flows through all worthy faith, affection, work 
and prayer, into the souls of men. We live not by bread 
alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth 
of God. That Word is proceeding still from the Infinite 
Wisdom and Goodness, still from the heavenly world and 
the eternal throne. Receive it ; receive it by every recep- 
tacle in our spiritual nature, by all thought, feeling, fideli- 
ity, devotion, and the life of God and heaven within our 
souls shall interpret Christ's saying, " As I live, ye shall 
live also." 

Futurity — eternity — is not the thought too glorious 
to be cherished by our poor nature ? There is not pre- 
sumption, but humility in the faith. In lowliness we 
most truly secure the good of the present life, and the 
mind is exalted by adoration of him who lights the earth 
for our path and fills it with plenty. We live now only as 
we receive his bounty. So live the life eternal ; and even 
now, accepting God's free Spirit, we may pass from death 
unto life. Reverently accept it. If we feel a reverent 
and lowly gratitude when we lift our eye to the heavens, 
and know that the gentle ray which touches so benignly 
its delicate nerve has been on the way from its remote star 
ages before man came into being, more reverent and lowly 
be our gratitude when the soul's vision is touched by th 
light uncreated, and the God who has filled the visible 
world with his bounty, opens to us the glory of his unseen 
and eternal home. 

" This world I deem 
But a beautiful dream, % 

Of shadows which are not what they seem : 



IMMORTALITY AS FACT. 261 

Where visions rise, 
Giving dim surmise, 
Of the things that shall meet our waking eyes, 

" But could I see, 

As in truth they be, 
The glories of Heaven that encompass me ; 

I should lightly hold 

The tissued fold 
Of that marvellous curtainof blue and gold. 

" Soon the whole, 

Like a parched scroll, 
Shall before my amazed sight uproll ; 

And without a screen, 

At one burst be seen — 
The presence wherein I've ever been," 



XV. 

Immortality as Itottlre, 



Eternity! Eternity! 
How long art thou, Eternity ! 
Tet onward still to thee we speed, 
As to the fight the impatient steed, 
As ship to port or shaft from bow, 
Or swift as couriers .. meward go. 
Mark well, O man, Eternity. 

Eternity! Eternity! 

Tow long art thou, Eternity! 

As in a hall's concentric round 

Nor starting point nor end is found. 

So thou, Eternity, so vast, 

No entrance and no exit hast 

Mark well, man, Eternity. 

Tbrsteegen. Translated by C. T. Brooks, 



IMMOKTALITY AS MOTIVE. 

There are some passages of our career in which the fact 
of the future state comes out from its shadowy mystery, 
and startles us with its solemn reality. A thoughtful 
man cannot enter upon any momentous enterprise without 
some intimations of the bearing of his conduct upon his 
spiritual welfare, and no man who has not wholly inibru- 
ted his soul by beastly sensuality, can do a marked wrong 
without some instinctive sense of the judgment to come. 
Over all the mile stones of our journey, stands the majes- 
tic presence of Eternity, like the mighty heavens, while 
lights and shades are the emblems of its decrees. Fully 
convinced as we may be of the fact of the future state, 
we may fail, however, even by the very greatness of the 
fact, to feel its power duly as a motive. The spiritual 
world is too often allowed to remain at a vast distance, a 
magnificent, but very remote reality, like that starry way 

above our heads, milky in color from the dim light of un- 
12 



266 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

numbered suns, whose whole radiance thus beheld, gives 
us less guidance than a lamp in the street through which 
we walk, or a taper in the chamber of our vigils. No 
small portion of the thought and labor of theologians has 
turned upon this very point, and of old and of late the 
great question has been, how most effectively to bring the 
powers of the world to come to bear upon the present life. 
The old priesthoods and the new radicalisms have had the 
same end in view. Whether by prayers over the mystical 
wafer, or by manipulations in the mesmeric circle, they 
have tried to call forth spirits from the vasty deep, and 
prove each in their own way, that human life opens into 
the unseen spheres. The ages of faith have not passed, 
change as they may in the character of their faith. There 
is faith enough in every living heart, to give great interest 
to the inquiry how ought a reasonable person to live in 
view of the fact of the future existence ? This is our 
topic now — the Future Life as a Motive, or more particu- 
larly, 

The Reality of the Motive, — the Nature of the Mo- 
tive, — the Urgency of the Motive. 

The Reality of the Motive ! How can the Immortal 
Life be a fact without becoming a motive ? It cannot be, 
unless the future life be so disconnected from the present, 
as to exclude the very idea of any influence proceeding 
from our actions and character here into our lot hereafter. 
Even supposing such total disconnection, and regarding 
the resurrection merely as a physical change, without any 



IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE, 267 

moral accountableness, like the transformation of a creep- 
ing worm into a winged moth, without the transmission of 
conscious identity, the change, if it could be foreseen, could 
not be contemplated without great interest, although in 
that case the chief motive would be in the mind of God, 
the active agent, and not in man, the passive subject of the 
transformation. That ultra form of theological doctrine, 
which comes very near this belief, and which looks to the 
fact of the resurrection, to make all men at once holy and 
happy, without respect to their character in this life, does 
not wholly exclude the idea of motive from its creed, since 
its champions maintain that the prospect of such boundless 
joy, and the conviction of such infinite love must needs 
subdue repining, and awaken gratitude and obedience. 
But take what we regard as the Christian view of the fu- 
ture state, in connection with the present life, and the fact 
of a conscious and responsible continuance of being, is the 
motive that crowns every other, and subjects all aims to 
the one master aim. 

The very nature of things leads us to believe that our 
future in all its extent, hereafter as well as here, must de- 
pend upon our conduct as truly as upon God's power. 
There is something in conscience itself which declares the 
eternal sacredness of the right, and bids us accept it for 
our present and future trust. The very sense of personal 
identity moreover implies such continuance of personality 
hereafter, as to connect the mind here with the mind here- 
after, by a bond which God himself cannot break without 
breaking his promise of a personal immortality. Allow 



268 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

as much as we may for the regenerating power of divine 
grace here and hereafter, the individual's own will is not 
destroyed, and the responsibility of its own acts still re 
mains. So obvious is this truth becoming, and so import 
ant is it to every earnest appeal to men, that it is finding 
favor with the sects once inclined to deny it, and those 
two extreme classes of dogmatists, those who maintained 
on the one hand, that some are to be saved and some to 
be lost hereafter, without reference to their works, and 
those who maintained on the other hand, that all are to be 
saved without retribution hereafter, without reference to 
their works, are disappearing ; and the leaders of both these 
extreme sects are preaching moral accountableness here 
and hereafter. 

The Bible is very clear upon the point, and from be- 
ginning to end it holds man responsible for the deeds done 
in the body. In the Old Testament, the fact of the spir- 
itual world is less distinctly set forth, yet is constantly 
implied, and although often identified with the continued 
national existence of the Jewish people on earth, the ac- 
countableness of each man in the future is declared per- 
haps all the more powerfully to a sensuous and ignorant 
people, by being associated with such temporal and mate- 
rial imagery. But when we come to the Divine Teacher 
himself, we find every word and act imbued with the doc- 
trine of responsibility to the heavenly throne and the un- 
seen world. All the parables in their visible figures, and 
all the discourses in their spiritual truths, rest upon futu- 
rity as the great fact and the great motive. There is in 



IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE. 269 

the very mien of our Saviour a solemnity like the majes- 
tic shadow of the coming judgment : there is in his tone 
a .deep authority that speaks of justice as well as mercy, 
and holds all men accountable for their talents, whether 
many or few. Say if we will, that most of his declara- 
tions regarding future judgment are figurative expressions 
borrowed from temporal affairs, and therefore not to be 
applied to the future state ; does not the same shallow 
reasoning apply equally as well to the promises of peace 
and blessing hereafter, and destroy the motive of grateful 
hope as well as that of rational fear ? Reject from the 
Bible as merely figurative, and not referring to the future 
state all material imagery, and we take the life out of the 
whole book ; we have the body without the spirit, the blue 
sky without the eternal heaven. In the most expressive 
imagery, borrowed from external objects, as well as con- 
veyed in direct and unequivocal words, our Saviour de- 
clares the accountableness of man to Grod for his deeds. 
His very mission to save men from sin, implies the doom 
of sin unrepented of, and his condemnation of wickedness 
around him, in its very tone, proves that he distinguished 
between guilt and misfortune, and in God's own name ar- 
raigns the transgressor. Nay his most gracious offers of 
privilege, his call to men to receive eternal life, have a 
startling earnestness about them, which proves that men 
have a part of their own to perform, and what is offered in 
mercy must be received by fidelity. 

On the ground of reason and revelation then, there is 



270 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

reality in the motive drawn from the future state, and we 
are solemnly called of God to live in view of the world to 
come. We proceed now to inquire into the nature of that 
motive. 

"We cannot take the course so prevalent, and regard 
this motive as very different in kind from all other good 
motives. Much less can we contrast the present and the 
future state so sharply as to consider contempt for this 
earth, as in itself any preparation for heaven. We cannot 
regard the spiritual life as demanding a nurture essentially 
different from the nurture of all pure affections, nor can 
we believe that salvation means any thing much more mys- 
terious in kind than the true health and peace of mind, 
which we may begin to know here. We do not believe in 
the mere ritualist, who hangs the whole of our hope upon 
receiving a consecrated wafer, which has become heavenly 
food under his hands, nor are we persuaded by the ex- 
treme dogmatists of a now very limited class, to rest our 
only hope upon the transfer of an innocent sufferer's merit 
to our account, without any reception of that spiritual life 
which is the reconciling and the atoning gift. We do not 
cherish the best of our earthly affections by such means ; 
we do not recognize God's present love, nor nurture pious 
gratitude by such means. As pure mind and heart must 
be essentially the same in all worlds, we are moved to judge 
of God's nearer presence by what he shows of himself 
now, and of true life hereafter, by the truest life here. 
The plainest sense, and the most direct philosophical ar- 
gument from the very essence of mind, would lead us to, 



IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE. 271 

this view of the nature of the motive. Is not this view 
wholly confirmed by the example and word of Jesus ? 

What can be more clear than that Jesus came and 
labored, and died and rose to throw open the spiritual 
world to the affections and practical use of mankind. The 
Heavenly Father whom he reveals, is the G-od whom our 
own hearts yearn for. The divine life which he lived is 
the consummation of our highest ideas of what is good and 
pure, true and lovely. He won the hearts of his disciples 
to himself by imbuing their devout reverence with the ten- 
derest affection, and when he went away from them, he 
tried to have them continue in the same feeling towards 
him, just as if he, their friend and Redeemer, were with 
them still, and heaven were but the completion of their 
earthly fellowship. Mark his words and bearing at the 
most solemn moments of illumination — as at the Transfig- 
uration, when souls departed came from the unseen state 
and stood by his side — or as at the table of communion, 
when he desired that he might be always remembered there 
even as when with them in the body ; — note the words of 
the Cross, in which with his dying breath he so tenderly 
commended his mother to his beloved disciple's care — 
note his bearing after the resurrection, when, notwith 
standing the mysterious change that was transforming his 
body, he kept the same heart for his friends, and said, 
" peace be with you," to his disciples, and called to the 
true-hearted woman who had followed him to death, 
" Mary," and drew that reply " My Master," which 
proved that the heart is essentially the same in both 



272 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

worlds, and its best affections have truest life beyond the 
grave. Nay, more ; that witness of Jesus gaining strength 
and beauty in all ages ; that promised Spirit, which men 
call Comforter, given in his name, what has it been doing, 
but always testifying of the community of life between 
the two worlds, calling men to follow the gospel of love, 
and win peace unspeakable by all worthy affections and 
faithful obedience ? 

Christ then joins his word with the evidence of our 
reason, to prove that the motive to be drawn from the 
future state resembles in kind, however it may differ in de- 
gree, from the motives that give the present life its purest 
peace and joy. 

So obvious and practical in its nature, is not the urgen- 
cy of the motive clear ? Our plainest reasoning, our con- 
science, our honor, our affections, move us to live for the 
future, whilst we are in this world; and what greater 
madness can there be, than to shut from our view the in- 
finite future beyond ? Shut it not from view ; but like 
practical Christian men, give attention to its solemn in- 
terests. 

Is there any thing to fear in the developments of futu- 
rity ? Yes, much to fear, although there should be more 
to love — much to fear, unless we can, by true life, rise 
above fear into love. True to the gospel and to the Chris- 
tian consciousness in all ages, we must preach the retribu- 
tion of God against all evil doers. There is judgment 
against the wicked, although he may escape the penalty" 



IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE. 273 

of human laws, or drug remorse to sleep by vicious arts 
and excesses. He who oppresses the feeble, robs the poor, 
despises the widow and orphan, watches in order to ruin 
the innocent, pampers his passions on human misery, tram- 
ples upon God's image in man, or profanes God's name 
and word, shall not go unpunished. There is terror in 
God's majesty for the wilful offender, and fear is most 
salutary when it wakens penitence, and so inflames the 
love which alone can cast out fear. Among men not 
wilful offenders, there is a chastened fear of God which 
always remains after the fear that hath torment departs ; 
a devout awe in view of the Almighty, and All Holy One, 
a shrinking from the very thought of arraigning his good- 
ness or slighting his law, a godly fear that clears the very 
fire of love from its clogs and ashes. Let no man be 
ashamed to say that he fears God, for the fear of the Lord 
is the beginning of wisdom. Fear him if we are doing 
wrong, because we offend the very love that is trying to 
bless us, and which wounds us to reclaim us from trans- 
gression. Fear him if we are trying to do right, for he 
whom we serve is not our equal, although we call him 
Father ; and our loyalty cannot be true, unless its very 
love be mingled with reverent awe which leads our loftiest 
virtue to bow with trembling before the mercy-seat. 

Such fear is the minister of that sacred love, the crown- 
ing motive flowing from the spiritual world. God is love, 
and we are prepared for his presence the more we partake 
of that which is the essence of his being. Here the glory 
of Christianity opens upon us who believe that the whole 
12* 



274 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

of life should rest upon a spiritual basis, and that heaven 
opens around and within us now whenever we practically 
accept God's love, and breathe it into all the uses of our 
sphere. True heavenly-mindedness only can interpret the 
real urgency of the motive flowing from the unseen realm 
where God dwells, and where the spirits of the just are 
with him. He that seeks this frame of mind cannot be 
proud, cannot arrogate aught of the blessing to his own 
personal merit. His highest joy is in being willing to re- 
ceive what God so freely gives. He does not presume to 
originate or create that sacred fire which inflames every 
worthy affection, or that heavenly water which refreshes 
the soul's inmost life. His best faculties are to him but 
receptacles of blessing ; and the more deeply he enters 
into heavenly peace, the more he adores the might of 
heavenly love. Over the retributions of God, he ac- 
knowledges the rule of the Divine goodness, and he cannot 
but believe that there is a love deeper than any abyss of 
woe. 

Who does not sometimes feel the force of this motive, 
and oftener deplore its absence ? Is it true that God has 
created us in his image, and called us to live in his love 
and truth, and sends out precious influence to win us and 
keep us within his kingdom ? Then what manner of per- 
sons ought we to be ? What becomes of our petty pride 
and insatiate vanity, our repining, our petulance, if we 
will but recollect ourselves, and cherish the sweet temper 
and friendly service proper for the subjects of a divine 
kingdom ! What becomes of our poor selfishness, if we 



IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE. 275 

bear in mind the bounty that has blessed us with enjoy- 
ment and hope ! The faith, which is the substance of 
things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen, instead 
of being a ghostly spectre, horrifying us with sepulchral 
terrors, becomes a cheering, benign angel of God, throwing 
over all our labor and trial and joy here the light of life 
eternal. Such words, indeed, shame our unworthy living, 
and it may seem presuming even to speak them. But 
frail as we are, are we ready to abjure all part even now 
in the power that comes from the unseen world, and to 
shut the everlasting gates that open more blessings than 
we can number to us and the children of men ? No. We 
will not part with our birthright. Strive and pray for 
greater fidelity — for more of that true spirituality which is 
at once practical and devout — which makes life strong and 
beautiful as it brings heaven near — which moves men to 
be heartier and braver as they are wiser and purer — which 
translates all prayer into action, and all action into prayer, 
that God's will may be done on earth as in heaven. 

Here, readers, we approach the close of our course of 
thought on the Circle of Life, which has occupied us in 
most of these pages. Circle we call it, because it begins 
and ends in God's Providence, and the same great events 
are constantly recurring. Yet strictly speaking, nothing 
returns to its beginning, and the path marked out for us 
by our Creator is towards infinite progression. Forward 
in time we are tending, pilgrims of a countless multitude, 
most of whom have gone from sight into the unseen world. 
If we are alive to true humanity, our heart must beat in 



276 MiLE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

sympathy with the vaster humanity that now lives beyond 
the grave — if we are alive to friendship, its holiest affec- 
tions cannot fail to have some cherished objects there — if 
we are alive to Grod and the Beloved of God, we shall feel 
the attraction of their hallowed presence-chamber within 
the veil. Along the advancing ranks, from the unseen 
portion of the company to the portion at our side, living 
influence even now comes to us and bids us beware of all 
unfaithfulness, and enter into life eternal. 



XVI. 



Mine be Sion's habitation, 
Sion, David's sure foundation : 
Form'd of old by light's CREATOR, 
Reach'd by Him the MEDIATOR. 
Peace there dwelleth uninvaded, 
Spring perpetual, light unfaded : 
Odors rise with airy lightness; 
Harpers strike their harps with brightness; 
None one sigh f ->r p) jasure sendeth ; 
None can err, and none offendeth ; 
All partakers of one nature, 
Gro* • LYRIST to equal stniure. 
Home celestial ! Home eternal I 
Home nprear'd by power Supernal ! 
Home, no change or loss that fearest, 
From afar my soul thou cheerest ; 
Thee it seeketh, thee requireth, 
Thee affecteth, thee desireth. 
Grant me, Saviour, with thy Blessed 
Of thy Rest to be possessed, 
And, amid the joys it bringeth. 
Sing the song that none else singetf*. 

Hildebebt, a. d. 1133 Translated by Neale. 



HOME EVEEMOEE. 

In our meditation upon Immortality as a Motive, I spoke 
of the influence coming from the vast array of Humanity, 
that has passed into the spiritual world. "We give the 
whole of this meditation to a fuller consideration of the 
subject. G-od himself is ever bringing it near to our af- 
fections, by removing our own companions by the way to 
the eternal spheres, and thus planting the amaranths of 
immortality among the decaying flowers that bloom along 
our path, and climb upon our Mile Stones. 

When a tyrant ruled the land, and the march of his 
minions was wet with the blood of the faithful, the 
thoughts of the early Christians turned gladly towards 
the eternal throne, comforted indeed as they contemplated 
the great multitude who had passed from the trials of 
earth to the triumphs of heaven. Not to that primitive 
age, nor to such tribulation, has the same disposition or 
the same need been confined. We are so constituted that 
whether happy or sad, we cannot live wholly absorbed in 
things present, nor be unmindful of the unseen world. 



280 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Our nature forbids it. Creatures of memory and of 
hope, we must in some measure remember all events and 
persons who have had power over our lives, and we must 
interpret the future somewhat in the light of the past — 
the present hour cheered or darkened by the things that 
have been or promise to be. A man may try to stifle the 
disposition, or hide the need of living above the present, 
by cutting himself off from all human associations, or by 
drowning his thought in the deluge of worldly cares. Yet 
even in the lonely wilderness, the solitary is still haunted 
by the faces that he has known, and they that have gone 
from the world to the unseen land, seem to hover around 
him, and things unseen become the greatest of realities to 
him. He too who seems engrossed with the pressure of 
secular affairs, has his part in the invisible. He is driven 
on in his career by a force of habit or association, whose 
origin is among things invisible : he is attracted by vis- 
ions of future success or ease, which have not and may 
never have any visible fulfilment. Nay, the mightiest 
men of action have been possessed by some dominant prin- 
ciple or influence entirely beyond themselves or their po- 
sition. The Alexanders and Napoleons have been influ- 
enced by historic examples, that live only in the intellec- 
tual horizon. Better counselled, better cheered, the he- 
roes of Christian history have lived and labored, as sur- 
rounded by heavenly presence, as members of a family 
part on earth, part in heaven. Every true household 
shows the working of the same spirit, and we look upon 
all as belonging to our home, and as having relations with 



HOME EVERMORE. 281 

us now, who have been taken from our side, and called to 
the unseen mansions. 

What nature craves, the gospel sanctions and teaches. 
Our Saviour revealed the eternal world as the soul's true 
home. They that were with him, and who lived after him, 
rejoiced in that heavenly household to which he called 
them, and deemed it a breach of faith for any Christians 
to be as strangers and aliens in that spiritual common- 
wealth opened to their love and communion. 

What nature thus craves and the gospel urges, the 
Christian Church has never failed in some measure to re- 
cognize. There may have been, there doubtless was, much 
narrowness in the ideas held concerning the spiritual 
world, and the claims to its blessings. Yet what beauty 
alike among the lowly and the strong, in the cottage and 
the church, what beauty and power too have been given to 
human life, from its associations with the heavenly com- 
pany on high. Indeed there are few occasions in which a 
Protestant feels himself more disposed to fall in with the 
spirit of the Ancient Church, than in respect to the festi- 
vals which open this month of November, in which we 
are now writing. The Ancient Mother, in many things so 
stern and ungenial, seems quite winning and amiable, as 
she calls her children to close the ecclesiastical year with 
the feasts of All Saints and All Souls. We cannot ask 
the Saints to intercede for us, nor are we taught to pray 
for the souls of the faithful who have gone from the earth. 
Yet to us not without instruction, comfort, and incentive, is 
our thought of the heavenly company who have gone to 



282 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

their rest, left to us their example, and call us to their fel- 
lowship. 

"We need to think of them surely, and the thought 
which meets this need cannot but have power, great power 
over us. Consider its influence first in enlarging and ele- 
vating our views. That great multitude not to be num- 
bered, of all nations, kindreds, people, tongues, around 
the eternal throne ! Meditate upon them, and how can we 
have a bigot's creed or a worldling's scorn ? All exclu- 
sive nationality, clanship, caste, speech, there disappear, or 
if any traces of their influence remain, they remain only 
to add to the beauty of that divine union in a harmony 
more perfect from its unity of spirit in diversity of gifts. 
The feuds of sect, often more bitter than those of nation 
or clan, are not found there. The various kindreds and 
tongues that divide the theological world, do not convene 
their councils or prepare their anathemas. In one great 
kindred of filial love all unite ; in one language of spirit 
and truth all join. There is the man of the ritual who 
trusted so much in the baptismal water and the sacramen- 
tal wafer to impart divine life, and whose walk was nearer 
to Grod than any mere ritual could lead him ; there, too, is 
the man of the doctrine who made a secondary thing of 
the outward form, and who trusted to be saved by imputed 
righteousness, not, however, without earnest striving for 
the righteousness which he claimed not as his own by 
merit, but as of faith ; there, too, is the man distrustful 
of ceremony and dogma, trusting in the power of good 



HOME EVERMORE. 283 

works, and yet by a faith working in love, saved from the 
perils of a proud and superficial morality. Thus the 
Churchman, the Puritan, and the liberal Christian little 
inclined to take the ground of either, are there. They 
stand in near companionship as they speak, not in the old 
tongues of technical theology or sectarian habit, but in 
the language of that heavenly grace, which is better than 
the tongues of men and of angels ; beyond the gift of 
prophecy, the understanding of mysteries and all knowl- 
edge. 

How can it be otherwise with the great communion on 
high ? The lives of the faithful, the word of Christ, the 
nature of the eternal life, warrant our saying, To what 
narrow border of Christendom, or to what great hierarchy 
have those qualities been confined, that give the soul peace 
and have promise of heaven ? Go for the standard, not 
to Papal calendars or Puritan codes of discipline, but to 
the Master. We cannot acknowledge any narrow standard, 
such as opens heaven to the Dunstans and Dominies, and 
closes its gates against the Fenelons and the Howards of 
Christendom. Do we ask who form the company of the 
Blessed ? The Beatitudes are the reply, and the blessings 
of the Sermon on the Mount have their consummation in 
the Heavenly Zion. The meek, the merciful, the pure in 
heart, the peace-makers, they and such as they, are blessed. 
To what kindred or tongue, nation or people are they lim- 
ited ? They who were Christlike in the world, amid its 
stripes and separations, shall they not be more so, nearer 
the Master, nearer each other, as partial vision is enlarged, 



284 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

and no longer seeing through a glass darkly, they know 
even as they are known ? Enlarging indeed is such a con- 
templation, and exalting too. It has all the elevating in- 
fluence coming from the study of the gifted minds who 
have adorned our race, whilst it throws a divine light upon 
their earthly experience, and connects the brightest pages 
of human history with aims eternal, and with life in heav- 
enly mansions. We are morally and spiritually elevated, 
not so much by our labor as by the use made of our 
inheritance. If we stand high it is because the toil, suf- 
ferings, virtues, wisdom of so many generations have 
placed us there, and the work of ages has combined to 
give us our home, our culture, our vision. Who so base 
as to be willing, were the thing possible, to renounce his 
share of the great heritage of humanity, his birthright in 
the great domain of time — to cut off that stream of living 
water that flows to him through the great channel of life, 
beginning in God, and flowing through the ages, its golden 
sands enriched by all that has been good, and true, and 
lovely in the world ? View history thus, how exalting is 
the survey. How much more so when we connect its de- 
velopments with the spiritual world, interpret the treas- 
ures of earth in their relations with the treasures of heav- 
en ! The wisdom that has here communed with the Di- 
vine mind, the love that has here soothed the sufferer, and 
yearned to rest in God, have not died. They live, and 
Cherubim and Seraphim, the angels of light and love scorn 
not their presence. The lowliest virtue and the sublimest 
intelligence there dwell transfigured. In one edifice, Im- 



HOME EVERMORE. 285 

perial Rome gloried in gathering all the treasures of the 
world's faiths, and in the temple reared by Marcus Agrip- 
pa, collected all the symbols and idols of the dominant re- 
ligions of mankind, from the monstrosities of Egyptian 
superstition, to the beautiful creations of Grecian taste,- 
and the stately forms of Roman heroism. Alone of the 
old temples that of the Pantheon has been preserved, and in 
the seventh century it was dedicated to the memory of the 
saintly names of the Christian church. " The capital of 
Paganism," writes Count de Maistre, " was destined to 
become that of Christianity, and the temple which in this 
capital concentrated all the forces of idolatry, was to unite 
all the luminaries of faith." To a better, a nobler, loftier 
temple even than that thus purified, the spiritual Christian 
looks — even to one that gathers the faithful of all creeds, 
and nations, and kindreds. Is the study of what has been 
noblest in man on earth exalting ? Look to the heavenly 
company, and how is the view exalted, as well as enlarged? 
Does intellectual greatness most win our rever- 
ence ? Then behold its consummation, not its apotheosis, 
but its Divine adoption : not its pride claiming to be 
Grod, but its reverence, the more exalted as it is more 
filial. Aye, genius itself, true to its sacred mission, not 
groping its way in feeble reasonings, but seeing truth in 
the light divine — not fashioning its conceptions of the 
lovely from things perishable and fragmentary, but from 
open vision of the Divine Archetype itself! Even the 
genius for action is there yet in being, and in more potent 
energy.' For the highest action even in this world is mo- 



286 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

ral and spiritual, and survives the body. The mind builda 
the home of charity, or gathers the nations into peace and 
order, before the hand touches the stone, or the arm of the 
law arrests the offender. The nearer that men approach 
to the Almighty will, the greater the power and the sphere 
accorded to them. Not in ignoble indolence do men live 
the life eternal. Theirs indeed is peace, but what peace 
is so great as the serenity of earnest and harmonious ac- 
tion, even the peace of Him who said, " My Father work- 
eth hitherto and I work," the peace that beams out from 
the works of the Father, and from the face of Him in 
whom the Father stood revealed ? 

We must not dwell more upon this theme — the power 
of the heavenly company to enlarge and exalt the views. 
Theirs is another ministry, and one still dearer. It is to 
attract and quicken the affections in part towards them- 
selves, indeed, but none the less towards God through 
themselves. The order of Providence is that the longer 
we live, the larger and closer is our relation with the un- 
seen world — the greater the company of those who have 
gone from us, leaving their mark on our minds, and their 
memories in our keeping. Poor indeed the lot, and 
wretched the spirit of him who counts friends and bene- 
factors only among the living. They that have gone in 
peace care for us, and we ought to care for them. They 
care for us, because Christ did and does 5 and they that 
are near him are like him. Nay, is it not one of the 
characteristics of a perfected mind, to care more ever even" 



HOME EVERMORE. 287 

for scenes and persons connected with its own early devel- 
opment ? A wise man thinks more earnestly and tenderly 
of his early home, the fields of his sports, the companions 
of his pastime, the parents and friends who counselled 
him, than he did when he was himself a child. The more 
we advance, the more we interpret and dwell upon the be- 
ginning, so that the analogies of human interest here be- 
low would seem to teach us that there is no Lethe rolling 
between us and the better land, to shut the living from the 
memory and regard of the departed. 

But God is our teacher, and in Christ he has opened a 
school for the heart which can reach depths that no hu- 
man wisdom can penetrate. Many a rough nature learns 
a lesson of faith and love there, which it is sometimes too 
proud to confess. God opens to our minds and hearts a 
high and holy realm of contemplation, to which few are 
wholly indifferent. As we contemplate that goodly com- 
pany, so vast, so imposing, and yet so winning in some as- 
pects that come near to each soul, a feeling arises, half of 
earthly friendship, half of heavenly communion, mingling 
all that has been fairest in memory with all that is loveli- 
est in hope ; so that we cannot say as we linger whether 
the power that attracts us is of man or of God, until our 
fidelity unites both elements in one, and by a sacred hu- 
manity we are drawn nearer to the Father, and both loves 
unite in one. 

The affections are thus engaged, and so too are they 
quickened. Looking thus upward, we feel the power of 
all worthy examples. The life that once animated them 



288 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

seems still to enforce them, and the annals of virtue and 
devotion seem to live anew as sacred preachers cf forti- 
tude, comforters of grief. The source of that power which 
comes from communing with the faithful in the unseen 
world, we need not be too anxious to analyze. How the 
departed act upon us, we may not say with dogmatic certain- 
ty, until we can say with the same certainty how the living 
act upon us, sometimes to lead us to Grod, sometimes to 
sink us in sin. Who is not willing to own a power above 
the ken of a sensual philosophy, in the influence that has 
come to him from those whom he no more sees in the 
world ? Who has not found in some sacred remembrance, 
in the cherished image of some benefactor, a ministry to 
his soul passing the aid of any abstract precept, passing 
the range of the material understanding ? God works 
upon us more and more by the ministry of the departed. 
In our homes they meet us in how many influences, in the 
sanctuary they speak to us often how mightily. In hymn 
and gospel we hear the words of souls now departed, in 
prayer and meditation we use their wisdom, and utter their 
love. The ministration is more effectual, as we connect 
what they have done in the world with what they are now 
above the world. 

We do not deem ourselves now as occupying the region 
of dreamy sentiment or idle musing. Active force comes 
from the thoughts we have been urging — power to cheer 
and animate the will, as well as to enlarge and elevate the 
views, and to engage and quicken the affections. To do 



HOME EVERMORE. 289 

well the various works of life, we need to know well the 
great work of life. Who shall teach us, if not they who 
have done its work faithfully, and gone to their rest ? As 
we seek them, they come near to us, and their words live 
for us, and their deeds act for us. The world's time-servers 
Will not meet our want. They may show us how to look 
upon the expedients of the hour, but they know nothing of 
the great and solemn interest of life. In transient disap- 
pointments, we need associations that lead us beyond the 
transient to the eternal — in present perplexity we require 
counsellors, from whose spirits beams the brightness of the 
eternal light. When we feel pain or sickness, we would 
feel also the assurance that they bore all this and more in 
peace. When we are on the verge of that gulf which to 
the senses is darkness or void, shoreless, cheerless, when 
things earthly are fading aWay, and friendly hands here 
below do not help us, do we not need the solace of that 
great company who can make us feel — not alone — but 
among brethren, more in number, than we leave — Him 
chief in the company who went to prepare a place for the 
faithful ? Read soberly the annals of the strong of the 
earth, whether among the lowly or the illustrious, and then 
say, confidently, that man is never so strong, in life or 
death, as when cheered and strengthened by faith in un- 
seen power, and communion with invisible minds. Christ 
meets the want in his promise to be with his own. The 
promise is fulfilled in all agencies that repeat his gospel 
and bring the Comforter near. 

Take home this doctrine each of us in the measure of 



290 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

our experience and needs. In some of the ancient church, 
es, I have read that there was a beautiful custom of calling 
upon the most venerable person present, to begin the ser- 
vice at the festival of All Saints, in remembrance of the 
departed, and of varying the age of the individuals suc- 
ceeding, until the last sentence was spoken by a little 
child ; thus expressing the great range in the ranks of the 
faithful, so commemorated in summoning age and child- 
hood to celebrate its various benefactors. Not thus in 
form, but in true spirit, elders and youth respond to the 
truth inculcated. In our own circle let all, from venera- 
ble age to lisping childhood, light the memorial taper to 
cheer with its light the tombs of the beloved that stand 
along our pathway. 

How much of the influence that has made and is mak- 
ing us what we are, comes from the invisible company ? 
Let any one of mature years think of his relations with 
the unseen world — think of all who have tried to help him 
in word or deed, in his early home, or in his varied inter- 
course with the world, through books that have nourished 
his soul, or deeds that have made clear his pathway. Does 
he not find himself rebuked for his too habitual worldli- 
ness, and addressed by a power that is attractive, ineffably 
winning even in its solemn rebuke ? Is not earthly life — 
I will not say despised, because of its baseness — is it not 
by this spirit redeemed from its frivolity, and consecrated 
anew as the gateway of heavenly mansions ? 

Let not youth shrink from the contemplation. In that 
great and innumerable company there are those whose 



HOME EVERMORE. 291 

presence may win the young heart to dwell with home af- 
fection upon the unseen land, not there, alone and deso- 
late, but among friends. In every circle, and surely among 
our circle of readers there is some child who bitterly needs 
such solace, to take the sting from the bereavement that 
has quenched to the vision a light and love which God has 
kindled in a parent's face. Life will have purity and pow- 
er as that image is remembered. To how many such re- 
membrance at once rises, perhaps of some devoted mother, 
or cherished wife, or darling daughter, of whom it is not 
too much to say : — 

" Another hand is beckoning us, 
Another call is given ; 
And glows once more with angel steps 
The path that leads to heaven. 

" O, half we deem she needed not 
The changing of her sphere, 
To give to heaven a shining one 
Who walked an angel here. 

We will not leave the topic without recognizing the 
stern moral which it urges by the very pathos which it 
moves. Do they that pass from the world still act upon 
it ? Are they remembered — does their example and spirit 
still speak ? No man liveth to himself, or dieth to him- 
self. What is our example — what our spirit — how are 
we living — how shall we be remembered ? They in this 
world, who are the happier and better because of our liv- 
ing in it, are witnesses that we have some hold upon the 



292 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

higher world. Our lives may repeat the beatitudes, and 
by blessing others we may win a place among the blessed. 
Thus the heavenly company point a stern moral, as 
they hold out a cheering hope. Power and peace meet in 
their benediction and their appeal. 



XVII. 

%\i §rat €n\t 



Happy those early days, -when I 
Shin'd in my angel-infancy I 
Before I understood this place 
Appointed for my second race ; 
Or taught my soul to fancy aught 
But a white celestial thought ; 
When yet I had not walked above 
A mile or two from my first love ; 
And looking back at that short space, 
Could see a glimpse of his bright face ; 
"When on some gilded cloud or flower 
My gazing soul would dwell an hour, 
And in those weaker glories spy 
Some shadows of eternity ; 
Before I taught my tongue to wound 
My conscience with a sinful sound ; 
Or had the black art to dispense 
A several sin to every sense ; 
But feit through all this fleshly drwss 
Bright shoots of everlastingness. 

O how I long to travel back 
And tread again that ancient track ! 
That I might once more reach that plain, 
"Where first I left my glorious train ; 
From whence th' enlighten'd spirit sees 
That shady city of palm-trees : 
But ah ! my soul with too much stay 
Is drunk, and staggers in the way. 
Some men a forward motion love, 
But I by backward steps would move ; 
And when this dust falls to the urn, 
la that state I came, return. 

Henry Vat/shan. 



THE GKEAT CYCLE. 

We have travelled some distance together, kind reader, 
and have taken notes of various aspects of human life, 
from its beginning to its close. "We have not hounded 
our vision by our footsteps, and have had some glimpses 
of the everlasting hills, and now our journey ends with 
their ethereal heights in the enchanted distance. Lest the 
guide might of himself be too tedious, he has secured the 
company of some of the sweet singers of our great Israel, 
and as we started upon each stage of our pilgrimage, we 
have had a strain or two of song to cheer the way. The 
sweet poem of Vaughan, u The Retreat," that makes our 
closing motto, expresses a sentiment that we must all of 
us at some time have felt, as we reflect upon our career 
We cannot help casting a glance behind us as we journey 
on, and it is an essential law of every sound mind, that it 
shall revert constantly to its own experience, and like the 
revolving wheel of a chariot, turn constantly back to itself, 
as it goes forward. We must return to ourselves thus 



296 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

whether we choose or not, for we can no more rid our- 
selves of the orbit of our being, than we can rid ourselves 
of being itself. Our own will can do a great deal for us, 
but it cannot do every thing, and even when the will strives 
the most bravely, it can only strive upon a path or tide 
which God has fixed for us. We may guide the horses, 
but we do not make the highway ; we may ply the oar or 
tend the sail, but we do not create the tides or the winds. 
It is well for us, as we close these meditations, to think 
somewhat seriously of the orbit in which we are placed, 
and remember that the strongest man is moved by a higher 
power, when he is apt to think that he is but moving him- 
self. At the outset of our career we are tempted in the 
giddy pride of young blood to suppose our will to be ev- 
ery thing, and when we have travelled far, and are per- 
haps weary and dispirited with fatigue and disappoint- 
ment, we are tempted to regard our own will as nothing, 
and to sink down into utter fatalism. Combine our young 
enthusiasm with our mature experience wisely, and we 
shall see the sweep of our own will, and of God's agency 
also in the great cycle of our being. 

There is surely something more than our own volition 
in the power that so binds our past and future with our 
present, and gives a retrospective turn to our most san- 
guine anticipations. Not only in his repentance does the 
wayfarer, like the returning Prodigal, come to himself, 
but also in all his just obedience and healthful progress. 
More than in a literal sense the pilgrim is ever returning 
to his starting-place, and whether his path be upon the , 



THE GREAT CYCLE. 297 

globe or any other sphere, he who starts from the East, if 
he goes far enough towards the setting sun, finds himself 
at the East again, with his evening hymn welcoming the 
morning dawn. The evening star that shone so mildly 
upon his twilight musings, will become the morning star 
that flames in the forehead of some distant sky, that meets 
him in his course, and Hesper may kindle into the Phos- 
phor, whose dawning he implores : — 

Let those have night, that love the night : 
Sweet Phosphor, bring the day : 
How sad delay 
Afflicts dull hopes! sweet Phosphor, bring the day! 

The first and most familiar application of this princi- 
ple to human life may be made to our remembrance of our 
own early days. It need not be argued, for it is plain 
enough, as before set forth, that our childhood is never so 
fresh to us as in old age, and that every true life in some 
way repeats the prophet's words : " He shall return to 
the days of his youth." What the psychological law of 
this fact may be, we are not anxious now to set forth, since 
we are concerned only with illustrating its truth. It may 
be that first impressions last the longest, not merely be- 
cause they were made upon a fresh and sensitive surface, 
but because constant retrospection has been all the while 
deepening the image, just as the object longest held before 
the silvered plate, takes the strongest picture under the 
sunshine ; and surely childhood is always in the sunshine 
as it stands within the chamber of memory, and is always 
13* 



298 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

thus deepening the transcript of itself. But whatever 
may be the explanation, we may be sure of the fact, and 
the wisest and the simplest men cannot but recur to their 
early days. We have already quoted Gray's charming 
Ode on revisiting Eton College, so full of touching re- 
miniscences, and we may borrow a still stronger illustra- 
tion from Goethe, who so prided himself upon his artistic 
coolness, and who yet could speak of his early days, in 
such tender strains as this in the Inscription to Faust, 
that wonderful creation which embodies so much of the 
meaning of our modern life : — 

" Once more, sweet visions, are ye floating hither — 
Forms, who of old oft gladdened my dim sight ? 

Shall I now hold you, beautiful, together ? 
Yearns my heart still for that illusion bright ? 

Nearer ye throng ! Let not your beauty wither, 
As from the misty cloud it bursts in light. 

How with the joy of youth my bosom springs, 

Breathing the magic air shook from your dewy wings I 

" Old days of gladness in your train come sweeping, 

And shades of loved ones start up all around, 
Like some old tale which set our young eyes weeping, 

First Love and Friendship come. Each inward wound 
Now bleeds afresh ; the old complaint unsleeping, 

Laments life's mazy course with echoing sound, — 
Names the good spirits, who, when joy shone o'er me, 
Smiled round me one short day — then took their flight before me. 

* * * * * * 

" What I possess now seems no longer real, 
But in the Past I live, in my soul's first Ideal" 



THE GREAT CYCLE. 299 

We suppose that the- same law of our being moves the 
more diverse natures, and that the play of the memory, 
like the beat of the heart, is pretty much the same in this 
majestic demigod of the German Parnassus, as in the low- 
liest reader of his verse. With us all, life, as it travels 
on, recurs ever to its beginning, for it has received its ap- 
pointed orbit from the same hand that formed and guides 
the spheres. 

But this recurrence to our early days is but one form, 
and perhaps one of the most superficial forms in which 
the orbit of our being indicates its revolving movement. 
We look back in our better moments, not so much to a 
certain period of time past, but to a certain spontaneous 
experience, and, to a true believer, childhood has its chief 
attraction in the retrospect, as revealing so much of God's 
image in the instinctive play of the spiritual faculties. 
We were made originally in the divine image, and the 
most extreme teacher of the doctrine of the Fall of Man 
and Original Sin, although it be Augustine himself, will 
not deny that there are in our nature some traces of that 
primitive constitution or selfhood, which came from the 
Creator's own hand. As we go on in a true life, and 
through repentance and faith win spiritual peace, we can- 
not but attach more importance to the earliest gleams of 
the divine light within ; and thus the farther the pilgrim 
travels, the nearer he is to his first home, and in coming 
truly to himself, he comes nearer to his own soul. Surely 
all that strengthens the mind, or quickens the affections, 



300 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

or in any way improves the man, faithfully interprets him 
to his own consciousness, and introduces him to himself. 
A great many writers, as already remarked, have spoken 
of the fact, that when we meet with any exalted truth or 
noble sentiment, we are apt to receive it as a familiar 
thing that we seem to have met before, in spite of plain 
evidence to the contrary. With some minds of no mean 
philosophical pretensions, the inference has been that our 
souls have lived in a pre-existent state, and that thus all 
experience appears like a reminiscence of that state. A 
noted American theologian has startled the sober orthodoxy 
of his brethren in New England, by insisting upon the 
reality of a pre-existent state, in order to justify God in 
bringing the human race into this world under a curse, 
which in his view can be only cruelty and injustice, unless 
all those thus born under wrath have sinned somewhere 
before this earthly probation. ■ But we prefer the poet's 
version of the psychological fact, and Dr. Edward Beech- 
er's dialectics are far less persuasive to us than "Words- 
worth's verses : — 

" Our birth is but a sleeping and forgetting : 
The soul that rises with us, our life's star, 
Hath had elsewhere its setting, 

And cometh from afar : 
Not in entire forgetfulness, 
And not in utter nakedness, 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
From God who is our home." 

But without yielding either to the poet or the theolo* N 



THE GPwEAT CYCLE. 30 i 

gian, why is it not enough to say, that every noble truth 
and sentiment that excites this sense of reminiscence, by 
appealing to the soul that God has given us, reveals the 
true or inmost man to himself, and developes vague h> 
stincts and dim intimations into conscious sentiments and 
positive convictions ? It is very certain that the farther 
we advance in true culture, in wisdom, virtue, faith, devo- 
tion, the more this feeling grows upon us, and the pilgrim, 
instead of going into a far country, seems to be entering 
more fully into his own home, and getting acquainted with 
himself. The ripe apple is but the blossom matured j the 
sturdy oak is but the acorn unfolded ; and so the best de- 
velopment of a cultivated mind is but the bringing out of 
its own powers, under providential influence, or in other 
words, the coming of man to himself. 

But where is our need of God, and what becomes of 
religion in this view of the great cycle ? If life appears 
thus to turn upon itself, what need of the Divine Mind 
and the Eternal Ruler ? Much need every way ; for if 
we study the orbit of our being wisely, we see at once that 
whilst like the rotating globe on which we live it is turn- 
ing ever upon itself, this movement, like that of the globe, 
is part of a majestic economy that rolls each sphere loyally 
about its central orb. The soul is drawn by its primeval 
nature, by its own inmost wants, by the revealed Word and 
the Holy Spirit towards God, the Parent of its being, and 
the Sun of its Righteousness. In fact its most signal ex- 
perience of the spiritual life is called by a name expres- 



302 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

sive of its true birthright, regeneration, or the new birth 
Thus the soul lives its true life, and is fully born when 
born of God, and becomes his child, not merely by creative 
power, but by redeeming and renewing love. It comes to 
itself in coming to God. It cannot live truly for itself 
until it moves in its due path about the Divine Light, and 
turns each phase of its being to the heavenly warmth and 
radiance. In its power, as well as in its weakness, the 
soul needs God, and bears witness of him. True to Him, 
we have growing experience of his own attributes, and of 
his sufficiency for our peace. We have true life only as 
we live in Him. The Mission of Christ was an approach 
of the Father to men, and an opening of the souls of men 
to the knowledge of the Father. They that received him 
had life, even the life of the sons of God. As they beheld 
his glory as of the only begotten of the Father full of 
grace and truth, they read their own being in that divine 
light, and saw that God's love is man's true life. All 
Christian experience but developes that great truth, and 
shows that man can come to himself and know the full ca- 
pacities of his own being, only by turning to God in a 
filial faith and living obedience. However brilliant his 
genius or vast his knowledge, no man can find out the best 
that is in him without seeking God, and without God he 
who thinks to gain the whole world loses his own soul. 
True growth is thus an awakening ; true progress is thus 
a returning — not in a monotonous and servile round, but 
in a revolving ever advancing cycle, like the vine climbing 
towards the light, in an ascending spiral, that turns ever * 



THE GREAT CYCLE. 303 

upon itself, and bends its ripened clusters towards its pa- 
rent root. 

The state of mind thus cherished by a true relation 
between the soul and God, is the true life which the gospel 
so commends. It is the life eternal that may be begun 
here on earth, and into which every true believer passes 
from the death of sin. Who of us shall presume to de- 
fine what this eternal life is, when the deepest philosophers 
are utterly at loss to define what time is ? As, practically, 
we may say that we measure time by succession, or by the 
passing of objects, or events, so we may say, practically, 
that we can estimate eternity by our experience of the 
Absolute Good, or of those truths and affections that live 
without decay, uniting the intensest vitality with the deep- 
est tranquillity, like the God in whom they have their be- 
ing. Perhaps all of us, however frail, who have tried in 
any measure to be faithful to our calling, have had some 
gleams of this experience, when we have been lifted above 
all chances and changes into that ethereal current, in which 
the soul is not utterly absorbed and annihilated, as the pan- 
theist dreams, but lives and moves in God, as the gospel 
teaches, all the more alive to its own being from having 
its life in Him, the Infinite and Eternal Love. The most 
spiritual and exalted minds of our race have had most of 
this experience, and in their seasons of fullest inspiration 
they have felt themselves consciously drawn away from 
their own self-will into the sweep of that eternal cycle, in 
which the creature freely moving, yet divinely moved, 
earnest yet tranquil, enters upon the eternal state, and in- 



304 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

terprets better than any dogmatic argument can possibly 
do, the prayer of the divine Saviour for the fulfilment of 
the great Atonement : — " That they all may be one : as 
thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they also may 
be one in us : that the world may believe that thou hast 
sent me." 

The very clod beneath our feet may, if we will but lis- 
ten to its oracles, teach us a far deeper lesson than any 
base materialism can give, and may expand into a far 
larger wisdom many a dogmatic champion of the schools. 
How many and what mysterious currents of influence act 
upon that little piece of clay on which we tread ! To say 
nothing of the magnetic and electric properties which may 
act upon some of its particles, we know very well that 
each of its atoms feels something of the attractive force 
that sweeps the spheres in their cycles, moons around 
earths, earths around suns, and probably suns and systems 
about some distant central orb, perhaps the chosen pres- 
ence chamber of the Eternal Word. If the dust bears 
witness of such a majestic cycle whose times rise into 
eternities to our limited understanding, what shall we say 
of the soul and the recurrent yet progressive cycles of its 
divinely ordained orbit ? Surely the dust that goes to the 
dust as it was, falls not without bearing by its analogies 
some witness of the spirit and its union with the God who 
gave it. 

So then in closing these notes of our life-journey, we 
take our stand upon the rock that cannot change, although^ 



THE GREAT CYCLE. 305 

every mile stone on our way may crumble into dust. We 
measure life not by the course of years, but by the charac- 
ter of its experience, sure as we are that quality as well 
as quantity must enter into our numbering of our days. 
The object is not to travel fast, but to travel wisely and 
well. We need in this impatient age, and in our fretful, 
restless country, to look carefully to the dominant temper, 
and in our vagaries of folly and passion to orient ourselves 
by the true light. There is something in that word " ori- 
ent " that we Americans need to study, for it tells us of a 
clime and a wisdom that we are apt in our bustle and haste 
to forget. To us, the children of the impatient West, it 
speaks of the East, and of the divine light that there 
dawned upon the nations. The East has been the provi- 
dential school of the divine life, and its commissioned 
prophets have borne witness that a profound rest of the 
soul in God is the essential mark of all true power, and 
that they who walk with God have a peace that the world 
can neither give nor take away. Do we not yearn for 
more of that true leaven with which God of old blessed his 
chosen servants, and with which the Divine Son was sent 
to bless the world ? Does not our best culture show some 
relentings of our rebellious pride, and some fond and filial 
yearning towards the birthplace of our best faith, the home 
of our deepest humanity ? Certainly by what is best 
as well as by what is worst in our American temper, we 
are called to check our unrest, and calm our passions, 
and quicken our faith in the still yet living waters that 
flowed of old from Siloa, and flow ever from the oracles 



306 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

of God, We complete our own lives and round the orbit 
of our own being, whilst we complete the circle of civiliza- 
tion by bringing our own Occidental energy into reconcil- 
iation with the true Oriental faith. Our race, like the in- 
dividual man, is stronger and wiser by tempering self-will 
with loyalty to God's will. The race, like the individual, 
can enter the kingdom of heaven only by being converted 
and becoming as a little child. Let our indomitable en- 
ergy ally itself with spiritual faith, and the Star of the 
East will shine upon us without eclipse in the path of its 
empire Westward. 

In some respects I am as ready as any man to glory in 
our country and its institutions. Nay, I think that we 
honor our country even when we most candidly criticise 
its failings, because we use the liberty which is our noble 
birthright, and thus recognize our blessings in exposing our 
defects. Certainly nothing can exceed the folly of the 
prevalent disposition to measure power and prosperity 
solely by quantity, count our strength by number, and es- 
timate our progress in the main by speed. We are un- 
doubtedly the fastest people on the face of the earth, but 
it by no means follows that we are the wisest or the hap- 
piest. A man may travel fifty miles an hour, but if he is 
upon a bad or foolish errand, the faster he travels so much 
the worse for him, for he is sooner at the accomplishment 
of the wrong. We spoil every thing by hurry, whether it 
be the dinner that we devour without quiet digestion, or 
the land that we exhaust by impatient tillage, or the health 
and strength that we waste in our haste to be rich, or ia 



THE GREAT CYCLE. 307 

the mind and heart that we fret and fever away by the 
constant round of excitement. In the opinion of some 
medical men we are wearing ourselves out as a nation, by 
our hurry and intensity, — too eager to get a living to be 
willing to stop to live. The statistics of insanity show 
an alarming increase of that fearful scourge, and ten 
thousand pale and anxious faces are writing their sad 
commentary upon our temper and habits. I am not fond 
of croaking, and believe on principle in the power of a 
cheerful heart. Precisely because of this power, I insist 
upon the need of a more tranquil faith, and more peaceful 
and steadfast method. We may all rejoice in the prosper- 
ity of our country — in the vastness of our domain — in the 
numbers and intelligence of our people^ and nevertheless 
remember that we are but human, and are exposed to all 
the perils that have been the wreck of nations in the old 
world. Whether for a nation 01 for an individual soul, 
true progress is to be measured by the character formed, 
not by the distance travelled. Not without meaning we 
close our notes of the Mile Stones on our way with those 
hallowed words that Jesus, the great Mediator between 
time and eternity, as well as between man and God, spoke 
when he embraced all men and all nations in his parting 
prayer : 

QDfjUf is 3lif* Etwital, tfiat tf)*2 nujjfjt Ritofo t$n if)* onI$ ttiu 
' $xoir, anil Itsus Christ, foftom tfiou fcajet stnt 



XVIH. 
A FEW CLOSING REMEMBRANCES. 



OCTOBER. 

Ay, thou art welcome, heaven's delicious breath ! 
When woods begin to wear the crimson leaf, 
And suns grow meek and the meek suns grow brief, 

And the year smiles as it draws near its death. 

Wind of the sunny south ! oh, still delay 
In the gay woods and in the golden air, 
Like to a good old age released from care, 

Journeying in long eternity away. 

In such a bright, late quiet, would that I 
Might wear out life like thee, mid bowers and brooks, 
And dearer yet the sunshine of kind looks, 

And music of kind voices ever ; 

And when my last sand twinkled in the glass, 

Pass silently from men, as thou dost pass. 



Bryant. 



It becomes 
A man, if aught delightful to his soul 
He hath received, to bear a grateful mind ; 
Kindness gives birth to kindness ; in the heart, 
When grateful Memory holds its seat no more, 
The Man to every generous sense is lost. 



Sophocles. 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 

A FEW CLOSING REMEMBRANCES. 

Twenty-two years ago in the summer of 1854, I ar- 
ranged for the press the papers that make up the sub- 
stance of this volume, and introduced them with an 
introductory sketch of " Companions by the Way." I 
remember well the day when that sketch was finished, 
the last day but one of summer, and just before the close 
of vacation, when the stern call to work was sending its 
whisper before into those last hours of play. Those 
years have brought so many changes in thought and 
affairs, in life and history, as to make the book an old 
story, and perhaps to hint the wisdom of letting it alone, 
or of trying to make it over anew. But there are notes 
of places and persons enough in its pages to move friends 
to ask for its republication, and there are records of ex- 
perience and conviction that speak best in their own 
proper words and would be weakened, if not falsified, by 
being written over under new conditions. Therefore the 



312 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

author, without claiming any especial importance for his 
efforts, or expecting any great number of readers, com- 
plies with the request for a new edition and adds these 
familiar remembrances of the later years. 

If it is an awkward matter, and may seem an ungracious 
task, to venture upon personal reminiscences after dealing 
with general topics of high interest, it is well to remem- 
ber that the simplest is likely to be the best way out of 
trouble, and that any sincere and truthful remarks upon 
the drift of the last score of years, will be sure to rise 
above personality into principle, and to open private ex- 
perience into generous fellowship. Certainly we are all 
travelling on together, and more and more we are made 
to feel how much we share each other's lot, and our fate 
is bound up with that of our race. I cannot recall the 
cherished companions, to whom this volume was dedicated 
in 1854, the class of 1832 of Harvard University, with- 
out associating the nation and the world with their per- 
sonal career, since they have served upon so many fields 
of peace and war, and done good work in so many spheres 
of science and art, letters and religion. We meet now even 
more regularly and loyally than then so long ago, and on 
the last Wednesday of every October we dine together, 
as many as are able to follow the welcome call, to see the 
old faces, and to sing the old songs ; to shake hands with 
the living, and to remember tenderly the dead, who now 
number more than half of the seventy-one names cred- 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 313 

ited to us on the Triennial Catalogue. Many names 
on that list have already risen into historical importance, 
and with these sober years and gray heads, the end of 
usefulness has not yet come with the surviving. The 
two class-mates who last left us, the Rev. Oliver C. Ever- 
ett and Dr. Stephen Salisbury, were gentle and faithful 
souls whose lives are a lesson to us all, and I name them 
here tenderly. 

Those of us who have lived in the great cities cannot 
live to ourselves only, and even our country rambles and 
restings are sure to keep us face to face with the eventful 
scenes and significant persons that are constantly shap- 
ing our experience. I cannot tell a long story now, 
even if I had one to tell, and I must be content with 
writing down a few remembrances of conspicuous aspects 
of recent life, that may perhaps interest old friends whom 
I do not see now as often as is desirable, and be of some 
use to young people who sometimes ask counsel of years 
graver than their own. For these I wish to make these 
pages instructive, even if I fail to make them entertain- 
ing. 

I. — UNDER THE TREES. 

"Within the last twenty years, we Americans have been 
thinking of country life as never before, and private gar- 
dens and public parks are memorable marks of the prog- 
ress of rural taste. It was very sad, that Andrew J. 
Downing, after laying out so well the public grounds in 



314 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

the city of Washington, in 1851, lost his life the next 
year in the river Hudson, and there is comfort in believ- 
ing that the banks of this river, in their homes and sur- 
roundings, will be a lasting remembrance of the founder 
of American landscape gardening. Happily his mantle 
fell on Frederick Law Olmsted, whose tour in 1855 
through Europe, with an especial eye to parks and orna- 
mental grounds, prepared him to take charge in 1856 of 
what was to be our New York Central Park, for which 
he made the accepted plans in 1857. That enterprise 
has told upon the taste of the whole nation, and in noth- 
ing have our people improved so much as in appreciation 
of natural scenery, and in the method of keeping the 
charm of nature under the hand of art. We have be- 
come a nation of travellers at home as well as abroad, and 
every beautiful region in our land not only attracts hosts 
of summer visitors, but warrants the building of public 
houses for guests. In one way and another we all live 
part of the time under the trees, and it would be well if 
there could be a general and judicious comparing of notes 
as to the best way of doing it. 

But experience here in the woods has, in some respects, 
had little variety, and may not on that account be worth 
telling. Our home has been these twenty-seven summers 
upon this little hill that overlooks Long Island Sound, 
and the only change of place that we have made here in 
that time, has been in buying the eight acres next below 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 315 

the cottage in which we were boarders, and in building 
the house which has sheltered us for nineteen summers 
after due enlargement for children, grandchildren and 
kindred. Our friends generally, and people at large, do 
not like such stability, and not a few sell their country 
places and wander at their sweet will, and sometimes to 
their sour discontent, into new quarters or rambles, when 
the summer heats begin. I prefer a fixed home with lib- 
erty of course to leave it a while, whenever duty calls, or 
wholesome pleasure invites. It seems to me, that the 
advantages of this course far outnumber those of the 
wandering life. For ourselves, we can say that for 
twenty-seven years we have found health in this air and 
in those waters, and, in a frugal way, we have found in 
this quiet old village the characteristics of country and 
seaside combined. There is a fine beach for bathing, 
there are beautiful drives and sightly walks, with neigh- 
bors near at hand, and with a thriving and growing city 
within a smart half-hour's drive. 

This place itself is somewhat distinguished over other 
American places in the fact that it does not grow much, if 
any, and that a new house is seldom built among our 
well-to-do people, whilst most of them constantly im- 
prove their grounds. There is far less business here, at 
the old centre, than in 1779, when the British troops 
landed from their ships, and burned the town to ashes. 
Yet the old character remains, and the solid citizens date 



316 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

their pedigree years before New York grandeur began. 
The minister of the Prime Ancient parish, as it was 
called, lives in the parsonage that was left to the church 
by the nephew of Roger Sherman. He has had such pred- 
ecessors as the Rev. Andrew Eliot, President Humphrey, 
and Professor Lyman Atwater ; and the parish dates from 
the coming of Roger Ludlow, in 1639, whilst the line 
of clergy began with the Rev. John Jones, an Oxford 
graduate, who, after a long ministry here, died in 1664, 
the year that saw New Amsterdam accept the English 
flag, and take its present name of New York. The Epis- 
copal church here has a record of more than one hundred 
and fifty years ; it gave to King's Chapel, Boston, its last 
rector, the Rev. Henry Caner (1747-1776) ; it had the 
service of the first Episcopal clergyman ever ordained in 
this country, the Rev. Philo Shelton, and now with two 
parishes it prospers under the charge of two clergymen, 
one of whom is a poet and scholar, and the other, in the 
next village, is a muscular Christian, a bold thinker, with 
a liking for sea and land adventures. 

If asked to state what are the advantages of having a 
summer home in a place like this, fifty miles from the 
great city, I can truly say to men who are occupied most 
of the year with business or professional cares, that it 
seems to me the best thing in the world. A parish min- 
ister can be here under the trees, and at the same time 
within call of his people, and he has the satisfaction of 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 317 

being always at their service, and they always know where 
to find him if sickness, or death, or occasions less sorrow- 
ful make his service essential. Then there is health of 
body and mind in the quiet of this country life, as con- 
trasted with the excitement of cities, and the dissipation of 
the great watering places. The true life depends upon 
the just combination of constancy, with change, and he 
who lives most of the year in the great city has stir and 
strain enough to make him need an interval of tranquillity, 
such as settled country life gives. In fact, you may have 
virtually four separate seasons by a good combination of 
town excitement with country rest. In the winter, and 
the weeks before it, and after it, the work is hard, and 
the excitement is unceasing ; then comes spring, when you 
can lighten your work a little, and run now and then 
into the country, and spend some days there when not 
kept at your post ; then comes the summer vacation with 
its full rest ; then the autumn call to go to work again 
with at first lighter, and then heavy care, as the busy 
season opens, and the world and the church are in full life 
again. I have found great satisfaction, as well as health, 
in this division of the year, and twenty years of close 
parish work, without any serious interruption by sickness 
or travel, were a fair commentary upon the wisdom of 
such method. Then, too, you secure good opportunities for 
study by this course, and you can find time during your 
spring and autumn retreats, and your summer rest, to take 



318 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

with you into the woods the important books of the year, 
as well as enlighten and edify yourself and your parish- 
ioners by studying some of the great masters of thought. 

There are certain points of economy that are to be 
looked to in choosing and carrying on a country place ; 
but without discussing these at length, I will only say 
with prudence you can be sure of having solid value 
for the money that you spend, and that with a good right- 
hand man to manage the place, such as has served us here 
for near twenty years, you need not have much to worry 
you. You will have abundance of vegetables for the ta- 
ble, as much fruit as you are willing to cultivate with care, 
plenty of milk for winter, as well as summer, and a play 
ground for yourself and your children to your heart's con- 
tent. In fact, the out-door school is the best for the little 
ones, and the true kindergarten is under the trees with 
the real objects about them to name and to study, and the 
merry birds to pitch the tune for their songs. The day 
is not long enough for these little ones, that make play of 
work and work of play, and hardly know the difference 
between the two, whilst kind mother nature looks on be- 
nignly to see the muscles swell, and the senses brighten. 

As to the influence of the country upon the mind of a 
student, or upon any thoughtful man, there is a great deal 
to be said in various directions. It is not wise to say that 
the fields, and trees, and rivers are sufficient companions 
of themselves, and that it is the part of wisdom to forget, 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 319 

or try to forget, the town and its people, mankind, and 
their life in the green woods. You cannot do this if you 
try, and the pastoral poets, who make so much account 
of fellowship with nature, always show that they have 
been schooled in society, and that they carry society with 
them at heart into their retreats. In fact, when you go 
into the country and quit the present excitements of the 
town, you have the town before you more vividly than 
when in the midst of its pressure, you have not time to 
consider current events and persons, because new experi- 
ences crowd them out. But under the trees you recall 
your social experiences. Events and persons appear be- 
fore you, with peculiar distinctness, and nature seems to 
be the camera which reflects unbidden the images in your 
memory, and sometimes tells you of what you thought 
that you had forgotten. For a time you find this office of 
nature most exacting, and she does not allow you to leave 
the busy world, whilst she saves you from new distractions. 
It is not true then, as a recent Pessimist philosopher 
has said, that the modern rural tastes are proof of the 
cursedness of our social life, because delight in the coun- 
try implies hatred of the town ; for the town is ever pres- 
ent in the country with every one who has had recent ex- 
perience of its stirring life, and one charm of the rural 
retreat is pleasure in watching, or remembering the dis- 
tant agitation, without being in the midst of its whirl. 
This nature, indeed, which is so ready a medium for our 



320 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

memory and thought, and so ready to write out before 
our fancy the secrets of our minds, is by no means a pas- 
sive material like paper, but has a charming life in every 
vein and leaf. Her kingdoms of plants and animals are 
not company enough for us, but they are a marvellous 
companionship that deepens and exalts other society ; and 
as with the persons who please us most, such as bright 
children and genial women, the great charm is not so 
much in what they say and do, as in the exuberant spirits 
in which they say or do it ; so it is with the spontaneous 
life that beats at the heart of nature. In the town all in 
comparison seems to be planned and mechanical, and life is 
set to clock work, and its business is done with calculation ; 
but among the trees an involuntary genius seems to rule, 
and these mysterious creatures, the flowers, the grasses, 
the vines, the birds are moved by a spirit of which they 
are not conscious, and you feel its power over your spirits. 
Whether we know it or not, this experience has much to 
do with the charm of nature, and in spite of the great 
shock which has been given to the spiritualist school of 
pastoral philosophy and poetry by the new theory of the 
play of atoms, and the explanation of all growth by me- 
chanical agencies, the spiritualist thinkers are regaining 
the lost ground, and bringing the atom itself to establish 
the fact of the ever present and ever active force, that 
lives in nature and joins nature to God. Here, within 
these recent years, the masters of the new science have 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 321 

been carefully read and considered, not without some 
perplexity of mind, and some disturbance of the old faith. 
But the trouble is not lasting, and the result is to lead 
us to discern in nature the rising path to higher life, and 
to delight in every feature of the landscape that hints of 
the aspirations of man, and the condescension of God to 
his needs. 

I have hardly dared to tell how constantly the land- 
scape here, with its inclosure of groves, and its distant 
view of the sea, insists upon suggesting visions of history 
and life, and how inevitably the prospect has shaped itself 
into a grand abbey, with its chapel and cloisters, with 
stones older than Muckross, and roof higher than West- 
minster, in which every sacred truth has its record, and 
every worthy act has its monument. But so it has been 
and is. I do not ask others to accept my notions as their 
own, or to see the spirits of the great men of literature 
and heroism, where I see them. I am willing to say 
that for me, more and more these trees seem to be like 
cathedral arches, and to take to their keeping, upon every 
hill and rock, the names that deserve best of mankind, 
and bring heaven near. God himself does not disdain 
to own his temple, nor frown upon the cliff that is sacred 
to his name, and the rock that bears the Cross, which these 
cedars have furnished, and the native woodbine has been 
so eager to clothe with beauty. He prepares us by the 
rising steps of nature for the Incarnation in which earth 
21 



322 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

and heaven, humanity and divinity meet together, and 
that sequestered grove is the shrine of meditation and 
prayer, that throws light upon the whole temple. 

It is not idle dreaming thus to give historical and spir- 
itual significance to the landscape, but a real power goes 
from the practice. Cut the name of Shakespeare or 
Dante, or Milton, or Wordsworth upon a mossy rock, 
and let some of the natural growths of the ground, the 
clematis, the woodbine, the bittersweet or honeysuckle 
embroider and illuminate it, and the man himself is pre- 
sented to you as an objective presence. He is there, and 
you no longer rack your own brain to bring his image 
forth from its secret chambers. This fact comes out this 
week, which recalls the death of Dante, September 14, 
1321. Put a wreath above his name, as our child who so 
loves nature has done, and take his great poem to the 
place, and see how he rises before you in his blessed sad- * 
ness, and he helps you to interpret his trials and your 
own, and points the way from Purgatory to Paradise, as 
where the spirit of St. Bernard was his guide towards the 
Beatific Vision where 

Within the deep and luminous subsistence 

Of the High Light, appeared to me three circles 
Of threefold color and of one dimension, 

And by the second seemed the first reflected 
As Iris is by Iris, and the third 
Seemed fire that equally from both is breathed. 

O how all speech is feeble and falls short 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 323 

Of my conceit, and this to what I saw 
Is such, 't is not enough to call it little ! 

O Light Eterne, sole in thyself that dwellest, 

Sole knowest thyself, and, known unto thyself 
And knowing, lovest and smilest on thyself ! 

That circulation, which being thus conceived 
Appeared in thee as a reflected light, 
"When somewhat contemplated by mine eyes, 

Within itself, of its own very color, 

Seemed to me painted with our effigy, 
Wherefore my sight was all absorbed therein. 

These words breathe the life of the old Catholic faith, 
I know, but they come to us through the father of our 
modern letters, and our new times that rejoice in this lib- 
erty cannot well do without his religion. 

II. — ON THE PAVEMENTS. 

It is pleasant always to go from the pavements to the 
shade of the trees, and in due time it is pleasant to go 
back from the trees to the pavement. The city is the 
centre of human life and where men most congregate, 
they ought to find God in the midst of them. It is hard 
indeed to live as we ought to do in the great crowd, and 
those of us, who have passed the most of our time for more 
than a quarter of a century in New York, need not any 
stern moralist to tell us in what a world of care, and 
trouble, and temptation we have been. Such a multitude 
of interests and excitements, such intensity of motive, and 



324 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

such incessant pressure of care, who can try to recall all 
this flood of affairs and experiences without wondering, 
that he ever could stand it at all, and that he has come 
out of it with a whole head ! Yet there is another side 
to the picture, and we must not forget that if the city 
makes many calls upon our time, it encourages the habit 
of organization that brings the many particulars into one 
system ; that if the pressure upon us is intense and inces- 
sant, the encouragement may be as intense and constant, 
if we make the best of our position and bring into play 
all the best helps of business and society, the refinements 
of culture and art, and the incentives and comforts of re- 
ligion. The forces that assail a man there are many and 
strong, and ever at work, and he must be many sided, 
strong and unfailing. It is a great thing to know how to 
live there in the face of all these difficulties, and they who 
go through the ordeal unscathed, should thank God hum- 
bly, and show their gratitude by encouraging and helping 
others who are more tried and tempted. 

We have had so many changes of times and fortune, 
that it has been very hard to know what to depend upon 
in the great city. And even the seasons of apparent 
prosperity have unsettled principles, broken up old neigh- 
borhoods and brought on frightful reactions. The sad- 
dest aspect of the city now, as contrasted with twenty 
years ago, is the diminution of the middling class of resi- 
dents, and there have been times when this class seems 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 325 

almost to have been driven out by the increase of luxury, 
taxation, and rent in order to make the way for the dom- 
ination of the extremes of the rich and the poor. There 
has been promise of improvement in this respect of late, 
and there is good reason to believe that more steady times, 
sober thought, and moderate living, will bring back some 
of the thousands of families whose modest tastes, and fru- 
gal habits, and serious temper, make them good citizens, 
and earnest helpers in all good works and institutions. 
The war fever, with its financial craze that went into 
every circle and movement, did a great deal to demoralize 
our people ; and even our churches were led by the pride 
of caste and the swell of ambition into extravagances that 
are now regarded with surprise, and repented of with de- 
liberation. Dives is called to bring his chariots and his 
coteries within the small space that is marked off as the 
charmed district, whilst the less favored children of God 
are left in the larger part of the city to the uncertain 
mercies of missionary chapels. Old Rome only keeps her 
trust unbroken and cares for all, with jurisdiction as ex- 
pressive as it is imperial. Her catholicity, in this respect, 
is finding acceptance elsewhere, and old Trinity Church 
has not yet bowed the knee to the new snobbishness that 
sacrifices the many to the mode, and such movements as 
bear the name of St. Augustine and St. Chrysostom are 
in the line in which those old saints loved to walk. Good 
Doctor Muhlenberg and his associates have not toiled in 



326 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

vain ; and St. Luke's Hospital and the Holy Communion 
Church are blessings to all, and Christ is ever near where 
the churches meet together thus in charity and in prayer. 
Nor must we forget how much all churches, who open 
their doors freely to all comers, even if it is for the 
evening service only, are doing for those who seek 
them. The pewed churches are, in some respects, free 
gifts, and in the course of the year, thousands and tens 
of thousands enjoy their eloquence and their music with- 
out any return. Those of us who have year after year 
spoken to crowded assemblies at the evening service, 
and who are constantly meeting the hearers who were 
not parishioners, have reason to believe that the minis- 
ter of the regular city parish does not limit his labors 
to the proprietors of the pews. A hard working body 
our clergy on the whole are, and they need their sum- 
mer rest to save them from utter wreck. Their work 
apparently on the whole prospers, and the pulpit and the 
religious press of our city are pillars of strength and 
fountains of light to the nation. The remark is some- 
times received with derision, but it is none the less 
true, that institutional religion has its centre and strong- 
hold in New York, and whilst ideal thinking prevails 
elsewhere, here the church as an institution, has its 
strongest defences, and for years it has been a power 
throughout the land. The spirit of the world is strong 
here, but it is not unchecked. There are indeed not only 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 327 

persons but congregations where the commercial temper 
supplants all spiritual loyalty, and the church consists 
only of a financial committee, a treasurer, and a smart 
man who is hired to preach as long as his preaching pays. 
But this is not the principle of the leading churches, for 
they recognize in the pastor a certain official power, and 
they help him to success by keeping loyally open the 
path of his usefulness. Those who have done their work 
under such encouragement, and retired when the years of 
moderated vigor come, should own gratefully the kindly 
auspices under which they have labored, and not be im- 
patient of the law that gives to every man his day, and 
calls him to quiet places when the evening shadows fall. 
It may be that the man, whose pulse no longer beats with 
the electricity that belongs to the metropolitan pulpit, may 
find as large a field in the calm studies, wide fellowships, 
various labors of pen and voice that retirement brings. 
One who has had three parishes in widening circles of 
numbers and labor, and done his best for them each in 
spite of defects and shortcomings, does not rightly com- 
plain at finding himself at last in the largest of all parishes 
though it may look as wide as the wide world, and he may 
seek not wholly in vain for the church that is without sect, 
and the brotherhood that is without bigotry or uncharita- 
bleness. 

The state of things in New York city is apparently 
more hopeful than for many years, and the superior men 



328 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

there seem to take more interest in public affairs. These 
men have been very remiss in this respect, and the wealth 
of the city has been lacking in refined taste and far-see- 
ing enterprise. Many men of affluence have lived and 
died there in our time without making any mark of no- 
ble manhood upon their generation, or leaving any lasting 
memorial of faith or humanity. There has hardly been any 
dominant public opinion which embodied the sober sense 
and general conviction of the educated classes and acted 
upon the mind of the multitude. Our colleges and univer- 
sities there have had little of the heart of the community, 
and in society at large money has lorded it too much over 
intellect and culture. Perhaps the break between the old 
residents and the resident population has come in part 
from the influx of strangers who knew nothing of old 
New York, and cared as little as they knew. The new 
times may change all this ; and the lessons of the war and 
the wreck of the public treasury by monstrous frauds, and 
the dread of further outrages in this direction, may com- 
bine with a better culture, and truer taste, and gentler hu- 
manity, and more earnest faith, to bring together the het- 
erogeneous elements of our city life ; and under the lead 
of our powerful journals, schools, and churches, they may 
give New York a nobler position before the world than it 
ever had. 

Certainly it is a very pleasant place to live in ; very 
healthy with its boundary rivers and fine parks and plen- 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 329 

tiful water, and generally mild climate ; very winning in 
its social tone, so tolerant, so genial, and, in its best circles, 
so charitable and devout ; so orderly in its characteristic 
citizenship, and so safe from fire and from tumult. I may 
be laughed at for saying what I do, that I found more 
roughness in Paris and London in a month, than I have 
found in New York in over a quarter of a century. There 
are streets here, undoubtedly, which it is not safe to fre- 
quent ; but where in London can a gentleman walk in the 
evening without being grossly offended if not rudely as- 
sailed ? I have never been robbed, to my knowledge, in 
New York, but I cannot say as much for the country, 
where hen-roosts and orchards are sometimes plundered, 
and there is little if any police. We have suffered indeed 
from monstrous abuses ; and the taxation, which all pay 
who own houses or hire them, is frightful. Let this be re- 
formed, and the rule of expense be moderated, and no city 
homes can be more desirable. The schools, colleges, art 
galleries, literary and historical societies, are gaining in 
magnitude and character, and when all these privileges 
shall be duly organized, and wisely used by our people, and 
brought within the range of the common lot, our health- 
ful and beautiful city will be the comfort of its inhabitants, 
and the delight of strangers, as well as the pride and 
strength of the whole nation. 



330 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

in. — OUR FLAG. 

No matter how retired or studious a man's life may 
have been for the last twenty years, there is one thing 
that has been sure to meet his eyes, and be very clear and 
vivid, as he looks back upon his path. We Americans all 
know that we have a flag, and we have all more or less 
suffered for it. The national heart was undoubtedly in 
our people before, but they never felt its beating fully, till 
the blow was struck at the life of the nation, and with all 
our habits of peace, our love of industry and our instincts 
of good neighborhood and humanity, we found ourselves 
at war, because war was made upon us by an insurgent 
section. It is not well now to try to revive the old 
quarrel, but one may fairly venture upon a passing ref- 
erence to the great struggle from a non-partisan point of 
view ; and only good can come from speaking a candid 
word of the part taken by men of moderated temper and 
conservative principles, and of the part which they are 
now called to take in the reconstruction of the national 
order. 

The war has been the tragedy of our civil history, and, 
to a great extent, the tragedy of our domestic and per- 
sonal life. Most of us have suffered in heart and fortune 
sadly by the conflict, and it has left us overburdened with 
debt ; and our young country finds herself under a load 
of taxation and embarrassment, that was thought to belong 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 331 

only to the oppressed and superannuated nations of the old 
world. Had the result of the strife been foreseen, it would 
not have been begun, and even the mad pride of South 
Carolina would have shrunk aghast from the vision of 
impoverishment and ruin, that have followed the assault 
upon a national fortress. Had the result been foreseen in 
the other quarter, certain provocations would have been 
withheld, and whilst the conscience of our serious people 
would never have consented to the extension of slavery, 
there would have been more caution and forethought in 
dealing with the evil. The doctrinaire school of reform- 
ers, who took it for granted that the world goes by opin- 
ions, and who seemed to think that a declaration of the 
rights of man secures to them their rights, would have 
thought better of the grounds of solid progress. They 
would have seen that true liberty is not merely an opinion, 
but a power, and that bondage is not cast off by a word, 
or even by a nominal law, but by new conditions of lib- 
erty and new characters of intelligence and motive. The 
Rousseau theory of naturalism which makes it out that 
human nature is perfected by being let alone, that civili- 
zation is a grand blunder, and that historical continuity is 
the lineage of tyranny, has done a great deal of mischief 
amongst us, and it went from the early visions of Jeffer- 
son, the philosopher of the Old Dominion, to fever the 
brains of the idealists of New England. These men 
have learned wisdom in a sober school of experience, and 



332 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

they see now that we cannot jump out of history any 
more than out of nature, that races have their historical 
roots, and that civilization comes in the historical line of 
law and education, without break or repeal. The African 
cannot be made Anglo-American or German by vote 
alone, and he must be what he is, and keep a subordinate 
place, until trained for something better. We are all see- 
ing the fact, that the slave spirit may remain after eman- 
cipation is declared, and that demagogues in the name of 
liberty may rule as malignly, and perhaps more waste- 
fully, than the old masters. Better sense of the need of 
education to secure liberty, and of the dependence of the 
backward race upon the advanced race for guidance, would 
certainly have moderated the rancor of the assault upon 
Southern institutions, yet might not have changed the final 
result. 

It is important now alike for the just understanding of 
the great conflict, and for the true success of the present 
peace, to discern clearly the two points at issue between 
the parties at strife, — the one point being the sovereignty 
of the states, the other point being the continuance and 
extension of slavery. The first of these had more to do 
with the logic of the dispute, and the second entered more 
into its motive. The question of jurisdiction was more 
one of reasoning and of pride, whilst the question of 
property was more one of interest and passion. He 
surely was a sagacious statesman who tried to separate 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 333 

these two points, as far as Charles Francis Adams did, and 
to suggest a way by which the southern point of honor as 
to jurisdiction could be saved without opening the new 
area of freedom to the inroads of slavery. But the sug- 
gestion was of little avail, except perhaps in showing in 
advance the temper that we need now in the work of re- 
construction. The slave power died of its own madness, 
and of the sycophancy of the demagogues and money 
makers, who played into its hands, and led its leaders to 
believe that their audacity would be safe as it struck at a 
peaceful and industrious people. Slavery is gone, and 
God be praised for overruling the madness of men to 
the glory of His Kingdom. It is gone and in a way that 
its friends expected as little as its enemies. Those of 
us who never favored aggressive measures, but who be- 
lieved in evolving the spirit and acts of liberty by the 
method of civilization, not by revolution, but by evolution, 
saw revolution accomplished without our design. We 
only refused to consent to the extension of slavery, and 
when the flag was assailed, we stood by it as the standard 
not only of the nation, but of civilization and humanity. 
We could not and would not see our birthright of Anglo- 
American nationality lost, and whilst some preachers went 
to the war as chaplains, or as soldiers, more kept to their 
post and preached and prayed, and wrote for the triumph 
of the nation, and for its firm and benign rule over the 
whole land and people. Some of us suffered not a little 



334 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

loss of friends and power, whilst all the while we were 
earnest for peace and good will, and we never forgot that 
the brave men who fell on both sides in battle were our 
countrymen, and that their wounds were ours and their 
children were precious to us, and to share with our own 
the blessings of the nation. 

The end has come and now let us have peace. It is 
well that the two great parties who now seek the control 
of our government have set forth platforms so just and 
comprehensive in this respect, and so full of hope and 
strength for the states that seceded. It is well that men 
of culture and character are candidates for the highest 
office. What is wanted as much as anything, is a compre- 
hensive, far-seeing, and earnest public opinion under the 
lead of men above partisanship, and beyond suspicion of 
self-seeking. This high council of the nation may not be 
definitely organized, yet it may none the less exist, and 
speak and act. The professional men of the country, not 
excepting the clergy, the solid business men, the professors 
of ethics and social science, the weighty representatives of 
the permanent industries of the nation, the conductors 
of the great journals and reviews, all ought to belong to 
this fellowship, and constitute an outside senate that will 
strip the mark from all villainy in high places, and by a 
just public economy give light and strength to every wor- 
thy principle and measure. The present aspects of our 
American religion promise well for such tendencies, and 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 335 

the great denominations that have territorial extension, 
as well as moral force, are gaining in union and influence. 
The Methodists, the Presbyterians, the Episcopalians are 
rising national forces, and the Roman Catholics, whilst 
their priests are to be carefully looked after in their rela- 
tions with our public schools, are not to be set aside as 
aliens, nor is their wholesome influence over unruly peo- 
ple, and dangerous socialist tendencies to be ignored. 
We are not indeed to confound church and state, yet we 
may nevertheless defend, and nurture civic institutions 
by moral and religious principles, and regard the nation 
as the body of which the church is the soul. The Holy 
Spirit rejoices in all the good fellowship of man, and 
is ready to breathe into them the breath of divine life, as 
when the City of God arose from the ideas and institutions 
of the old Law and Temple in the vision of Augustine, 
and Hildebert saluted the Paraclete as " Melodia civium 
gandentium," the melody of joyful citizens. "We have 
heard something of that melody in the hymns of our peo- 
ple, and we shall hear more of it, when they all rejoice 
together under the old flag, and march to the same airs 
of liberty and union. 

Fourteen years ago, in 1862, when our conflict was 
most intense, a stone cutter on the way to the war carved 
in deep letters on the cliff overhanging our road, the 
words " God and our Country." He won honors in 
battle, and had an officer's commission in keeping with 



336 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

his merit. The inscription remains and means more than 
ever now. When I look at it, I often think of what has 
happened to interpret that saying. A single remembrance 
speaks volumes, and I can hardly believe what I know to 
be true, that the two groomsmen at a marriage which I 
was called from the country to perform in my own house 
in the city, the summer before the war, the two grooms- 
men, I say, were afterwards strangely associated with the 
two war presidents ; and one of them, afterwards in this 
service, wrote the life of General Grant, and the other 
in a fit of melo-dramatic madness took the life of Abra- 
ham Lincoln. That blonde bride is in her grave, and 
seldom have the marriage bells had more eventfil echoes 
in their sound. Yet the church bells still ring in the 
nation's jubilee, and God and our Country ring out in 
their notes. 

IV. — ABROAD. 

Our American people at large seem to have gone or to 
be going to Europe, and a considerable part of them are 
ambitious to go round the world. A considerable propor- 
tion of travelled Americans have written and published 
letters from abroad, and whilst the writer acknowledges 
his share of that often infirmity, he is not weak enough 
now to venture to do it over again ; but he aims only to 
give a few notes of the impressions left upon him by a 
visit of less than a year, at the time of life when experi- 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 337 

ence has sobered enthusiasm, and the study of books has 
made it as instructive as it is charming to compare the old 
world itself with what has been said and sung about it. 

They are not wise who expect that voyages or travel 
will take them out of nature, or away from mankind and 
from the old Adam that marks man everywhere. The 
American finds in Europe much of what he left at home 
and most of all he finds himself and his kindred and es- 
sentially familiar ideas and usages in the lands from which 
his fathers came. Yet the old world, because it is old,, 
differs from the new, and a thoughtful observer sees at 
once, that things are more taken for granted, and manners 
and habits are far more fixed there than here. It is ac- 
knowledged abroad more than with us, that every one 
cannot do everything, that there is a limit to a man's 
reasonable expectations and powers, and in spite of the 
shaking of old dynasties and the rise of dashing upstarts, 
the sense of caste is very strong ; and most people seem 
to expect to live and die in the rank, and generally in the 
calling, of their fathers. There is an acquiescence in po- 
sition, however lowly or lordly it may be, that is quite in 
contrast with our new America, where every boy may ex- 
pect to be president and every girl may dream of being 
the president's wife, or sharing a millionaire's palace, 
purse and equipage. The comely young woman, whom 
you see with her mother digging the hard soil with the 
mattock at Interlachen, has the look of mild acquiescence 
22 



338 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

quite as much as the soldier who rides to the daily drill 
over the Rhine at Cologne, or is trained at the guns in 
the mountain fortress of Konigstein. The baker, who 
sells you his gooseberry tarts near Westminster Abbey, is 
as easy at his counter, as the dean in his stall or the 
bishop on his throne. The landlady at the Grosvenor 
Hotel in old Chester, accepts her position as graciously as 
the Duchess at Eaton Hall, and in both of them you see 
the heritage of time and the traits of loyalty that long 
ages have settled. If life in its lower estate there may 
run in dull ruts, in the higher plane it moves in stately 
paths or flows in graceful channels, where the waters may 
none the less dance and sparkle because the way is worn, 
a bound is set, and mud and rocks and quicksands do not 
interfere. 

This characteristic of the old world appears in the pre- 
dominance of institutions over individuals. With us the 
individual, the personality is everything ; and the very 
sanctuary of worship is likely to bear the name of the 
man who preaches there, and who may be praised for the 
eloquence of his prayers as well as his sermons. There 
the man is second to the institution, and in the Church of 
England you can often hardly tell one voice from another 
in the drawling rhythm of song and prayer, and sometimes 
of sermon. Mr. Moody was a marvel, because he stood 
out so bravely as a man in preaching and in prayer, and 
much of Spurgeon's success comes from his bold individu- 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 339 

alism in face of the uniform cut of manner and tone 
which marks the rank and file of the regular clergy. 
Even when thinking is bold, manner may be monotonous, 
and no one can appreciate the reform now introduced into 
the English pulpit by such stirring preachers as McGee, 
Bishop of Peterborough, who has not observed the pre- 
vailing monotony of the English clergy. This fault does 
not of necessity come from the use of a liturgy, for the 
liturgy may be read with vital expression, and may give 
the devotional rest and comfort that help fervent utter- 
ance, when the preacher has his own word to say, whilst 
there can be no doubt that the great length of the ser- 
vice in the Church of England tends to take the life out 
of his voice, if he is obliged to be the reader, and to substi- 
tute rapid gabble for articulate expression. The liturgy, 
like all other institutions, requires life in the minister to 
save its constancy from stagnation ; yet take it as it is 
actually rendered with the average fidelity, it cannot be 
charged with deadening devotion. It embodies the or- 
ganized faith of ages, and the English homes that have 
been nurtured under its influence need not shrink from 
comparison with any other homes in Christendom. 

Institutions may be called the art that rises in history, 
for they show the heart and mind and work of com- 
munities and centuries ; and they are history embodied. 
It is well to interpret all art somewhat in this way, and 
to regard poems and pictures, statues and buildings, as 



340 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

being quite as much expressions of history as are laws 
and schools and letters. Europe becomes peculiarly in- 
teresting when interpreted in this way, and art is evi- 
dently gaining power by presenting the main points of 
history in living personality. It is no longer the syco- 
phant of kings, as at Versailles, or the master of cere- 
monies of Sacerdotalism, as in so much of sculpture and 
painting of Rome, but it is the interpreter of God and 
humanity as they appear and speak in time. There is a 
union of calmness and force in its great works, that re- 
mind you of the Word and Spirit that give peace and 
power to everything that is divinely human. The cul- 
ture that is thus presented is not assailing, but befriend- 
ing religion in many ways, and especially by teaching 
that the great things have been done by struggle, that 
every victory is won by sacrifice, and we who set up the 
statues of saints and sages and heroes, must not condemn 
ourselves by forgetting their valor. It is well for Italy 
to see Dante in visible form at Florence and Naples, and 
to trace from him to Cavour the lineage of liberty. It 
is well for Germany to set up Hermann and Luther in 
bronze before the nation, and not to forget Goethe, and 
Schiller, and Humboldt, and Stein. Bunyan and Baxter 
are out of prison, and with Cromwell and Milton, among 
the great teachers in England, they speak to the eye as 
never before. France is revising her record and giving 
her metal and her marble to do honor to principles, and 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 341 

men that her kings and emperors set at naught. She 
sends the statue of Lafayette to America, and sets up the 
grand figure of Liberty in the harbor of New York. 

To an American, especially to a New Englander, Eng- 
land is the great attraction abroad, and to an American 
of Puritan origin, her church is more interesting than all 
foreign churches. One asks many questions as to the 
Church of England, but the main question is, how stands 
the old quarrel, and how far is the son of the Puritans, 
called upon in honor to turn away from that mother 
church, in respect for the fathers who came out of it to 
find a new home and church on these shores. The reply 
cannot but be explicit for a man of a comprehensive 
mind and a generous temper. Instead of Laud and 
Strafford, the English Church now presents Tait and 
Gladstone as the leaders of clergy and laity, and it is 
not only in the breadth, but in the height of her com- 
munion, that her excellence lies. She secures the liberty 
of her bolder thinkers and encourages the charity and 
piety of her most earnest devotees. Lord Falkland and 
Provost Whichcote of two centuries ago would find her 
friendly to their aspirations, and John Wesley would 
never have been cast adrift by the present leaders of her 
opinion. It is surely a great reach of intellectual and 
spiritual emancipation, when you can, under the auspices 
of this Church, range from the charming scholarship of 
Dean Stanley to the grave eloquence of Canon Liddon, 



342 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

go from the Platonic culture of the Master of Baliol to 
the ascetic discourses of the Warden of Clewer, and have 
the influence of bishops like Trench, with his rich learn- 
ing, and Wilberforce with his vigorous statesmanship, and 
whose latest comers have presented such varieties as the 
liberal Richard Temple, and the conservative Harold 
Browne. Nor is the English Church let down by the 
fact that she has been able to spare such men of power 
as Newman and Manning, the latter the most wide awake 
prelate that I have seen. A New Englander who goes 
to England with experiences of the narrowness of sec- 
tarianism, and the uncertainty of individual purposes, and 
the necessity of institutional order and historical faith, 
cannot but be impressed favorably by the aspects of the 
church of his fathers. He who sees the undoubted fact 
that at home and abroad the choice of people for them- 
selves and their children, must be between the organized 
historical church in some of its leading forms, and what 
is called Free Religion without creed or law or clergy, 
cannot but look with hope and affection upon the Church 
of England. That her method is not perfect, and that 
her system needs reform, her clergy and laity know per- 
haps better than any outsiders, and their humility is not 
their weakness. But imperfect as in some respects the 
administration of Church affairs may be in England, her 
Church has order as well as faith, and to men who have 
had experience of the caprice of opinion, and the inso- 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 343 

lence of voluntary lords over congregations and clergy, 
there is something very winning in impartial law. 

It is not strange that a descendant of one of those pil- 
grims who went from the south of England and whose 
kindred had worshipped centuries ago in Salisbury and 
Winchester Cathedrals, should find peculiar attraction in 
that region — not strange that after visiting at Bemerton, 
Hurst, and Brighton the churches of George Herbert, 
John Keble, and Frederick Robertson, he found the old 
birthright restored to him, and that he left England for 
France at heart within the church of his fathers, at once 
sure that he had not deserted the humanities of the new 
times and that he had a deepened sense of the worth of 
the old catholicity. There was not a little in the charac- 
ter and culture of the English dissenters, 1 especially of 
the Liberals, whom he saw so pleasantly, that tended to 
favor the English Church. Their genial homes and their 
personal accomplishments were proofs of their affinity 
with the old faith and manners. A broad church liberal 
like Charles Beard, not only expressed much of a devo- 
tee's love for the ancient shrines, but publicly protested 

1 George Herbert Curteis, in his Bampton Lecture of 1872, speaks thus 
of the Unitarians of England : "In personal character many Unitarians 
represent the very highest tj T pe of Christian manhood. In ability and 
learning, their ministers are often on a par with our own. To theology 
they not unfrequently make valuable contributions. In ecclesiastical 
matters, their tendency is rather towards the Church of England than 
awav from her." 



344 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

against assailing their rightful endowments, and a schol- 
arly pastor like Thomas Sadler and a profound theistic 
philosopher like James Martineau had as much of the 
English liturgy in their worship as their doctrines and 
their position would allow. An American who had given 
commemorative discourses upon such old English reform- 
ers as Wycliffe and Milton, and such new men as Milman 
and Keble, Robertson and Maurice, as well as upon the 
evangelical German leaders, Schleiermacher and Rothe, 
need not be thought capricious or inconsistent for finding 
so much to please or instruct him in quarters, ecclesiasti- 
cally so wide apart in England, or for remembering so 
gratefully the kindness he everywhere received. 

V. — STUDIES. 

Not only for the importance of the thing itself, but to 
meet the wishes of earnest young men who have entered 
upon new ethical and theological studies, I may venture 
to give a few notes of the men and principles that have 
had most to do with what has been wisest and best in ex- 
perience. It is as false and foolish to say, that a man 
ought to think and act and live from himself alone, as it is 
wicked to say that he ought to live for himself alone ; 
and the great champions of individualism refute them- 
selves by their study of the great masters, and by their 
delight in docile followers. We New England boys of a 
half century ago, lived in a time of rising independence, 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 345 

and we saw in our days every yoke of authority laid 
aside, and in time the protest against precedent was car- 
ried out into the assertion of the absolute supremacy of 
the private conscience and the individual soul. Yet the 
new liberty but changed the leadership without snapping 
the leading strings. Those of us who were not radicals 
by temperament or training, need not be ashamed to own 
our guides. 

Where should a Massachusetts boy find his model man, 
his guiding thinker and his constant friend, but in his 
pastor ? I have spoken of our pastor in the introduction 
to this volume, and I can now say, that he, whose voice 
I heard when a little child in the burial service that 
prayed for God's blessing upon us as fatherless, was my 
adviser and friend to his death, a period of more than 
fifty years. He was a master of practical wisdom as well 
as of speculative philosophy, a judge of human nature, 
and no novice in the world's prudence and thrift. His 
mind was logical, ethical and judicial, rather than emo- 
tional, aesthetic and executive. Perhaps his best power 
came out in the pulpit, where his remarkable manner 
gave weight to his remarkable words, and both manner 
and words told together in certain sentences that hearers 
can never forget, and which often give point and force to 
the close of his sermon, as when an arrow is shot to 
its mark by a strong hand from the bowstring. James 
Walker died December 23, 1874, aged eighty years, after 



346 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

some years of retirement and of limited bodily vigor, 
but without loss of mental power. His conversation was 
never more keen and witty than in his later years, and 
the last time that I saw him, although suffering somewhat 
from a local difficulty, he was full of interest in life, and 
he spoke with much emphasis of the great struggle in 
Europe between the human mind and the old despotism, 
with hearty indorsement of the liberating champions, 
strong for Bismarck and Germany against Antonelli and 
Rome. A few months before, his old parishioners and 
friends had sent him some beautiful and original pieces of 
sculptured silver work in commemoration of his finished 
fourscore years. The gift was carried to him on a lovely 
Sunday morning in August, with bright and sweet flowers 
from his old parish in Charlestown. This act seemed to 
round his life in its fulness, and the silver cup and plate 
now are lasting memorials of him in King's Chapel, Bos- 
ton, where he was last called to be preacher, and where 
they are seen on the communion table at Christmas, 
Easter, and Whitsunday. 1 

Dr. Walker represented the ethical and philosophical 
elements in our early Christian life, and his preaching 

1 I cannot but associate him with the two other friends of early days, 
who bore also the name of Walker, and also a fourth of the name, 
Timothy Walker, of Cincinnati, to whom I am indebted for much kind- 
ness. Our family physician, William J. Walker, died first, and our 
schoolmaster, Cornelius Walker, lived until last year, the same tough 
personality to the last. 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 347 

was the dominant influence in our town, and it had influ- 
ence in the whole neighborhood. Many cool headed men 
thought him a safer guide than Dr. Channing, who was 
more of an enthusiast for ideas, and who brought new ele- 
ments of reform and progress into the pulpit and litera- 
ture of Massachusetts, not without serious alarm to the 
large class of weighty men who, like his class-mate Judge 
Story, had been liberals in religion and in some respects 
radicals, whilst they were stiff conservatives in society and 
politics. Dr. Channing was surely a great power in those 
days, and his influence is too large a subject to be dwelt 
upon in this hasty sketch. I will only say of him now, 
that his widest and most lasting work is seldom recog- 
nized — his persistent union of the idea of dignity of hu- 
man nature with the positive faith in Christ as a divine 
person and the prevailing mediator. Strong individualist 
as he was, and so jealous of the interference of associa- 
tions with the individual soul, as to be little of a church- 
man, he dwelt earnestly upon the reconciliation of the 
sects, and the reunion of Christendom under the reign of 
Christ. Vehement as he was against the Calvinistic 
dogma of the total wreck of human nature by the Fall, 
and earnest champion as he was for the existence and 
force of the moral sense in man, he never encouraged 
self-dependence apart from divine grace, and we find in 
his pages many intimations of convictions not unfriendly 
to the old Catholic view of man, as needing God's grace 



348 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

not merely to forgive his sins, but to meet his aspirations 
and to help his endeavors after that divine life which 
came from God to Eden, and was offered anew and fully 
in Christ. Before this century closes, William Ellery 
Channing, with all the limitations in his range of learning 
and his reach of thought, will be honored as one of the 
heralds of the Catholicity that is to be wrought out 
through the union of the priestly, the evangelical, and the 
liberal elements in the Church of the living God. He 
held to the end to his connection with Christ and the 
church ; in his last discourse among the Berkshire hills, 
he prayed for the coming of the kingdom of the Son, and 
those of us who have received from his hands the cup of 
communion, will never forget how devout he was in its 
administration, and how full of love for the risen Lord. 

The studies that made the most mark upon our set 
at the Cambridge Theological School were more in the 
ethical, literary, and philosophical than in the dogmatic 
and ecclesiastical line. I remember in a careful study for 
an essay on Sir James Mackintosh, how strong was the 
impression that Bishop Butler's sermons on Human Na- 
ture made upon me in vindication of the Moral Sense, 
and how much Coleridge's "Aids to Reflection" did to 
back up this impression, and also to throw light on the 
relation of the pure reason to the truths of religion, and 
the graces and virtues of Christianity. The poets, too, 
came in for their share of influence, and Goethe and 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 349 

Wordsworth were read with much delight, as interpreters 
of the harmony of the universe, and of the need of living 
in the serenity and earnestness that become the great tem- 
ple in which we are, and of opening into our religious 
life the freedom and beauty and grandeur of nature, and 
of the noblest art. 

The theologian who did most to correct the subjective 
one-sidedness, and the ideal sentimentalism of our school 
life, was Olshausen, who was first introduced to me by my 
steadfast friend, James Freeman Clarke, at Louisville, 
Kentucky, and whom we studied many a morning and 
eveniag together, and commented upon and translated his 
learned and devout pages. Olshausen impressed me much 
by his habit of gathering up the meaning of Scripture 
texts under dominant principles, and even more by his 
philosophy of matter and spirit, body and soul, and the 
Incarnation and the Church, in which the material and the 
spiritual elements and forces were so combined and rec- 
onciled. He taught me to see as never before the realism 
of Christianity, and the way of shunning the dreamy sub- 
jectivity of transcendentalism, and of believing in the In- 
carnate Word, the Enduring Church, and the immortal life 
without sinking into materialism. I never can forget the 
benefit, and have had Olshausen's works always at hand, 
although later thinkers and scholars may have interfered 
with his former place in the library. 

In the first term of parish life, for several years, De 



350 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Wette was a favorite author, and I studied him much and 
translated his two volumes on " Practical Ethics." His 
value was in the freshness and comprehensiveness of his 
critical learning, his recognition of the devout as well as 
the ethical side of religion, and perhaps not least of all in 
his distribution, according to the method of Fries, of the 
faculties of the mind into Wissen, Glauben, and Ahnung, 
knowing, believing, and aspiring, a division which gave 
room for the facts of science, the ideas of theology, and 
the mysteries of religion. Every guide was then a helper 
who relieved us from the prosaic moralizing and meagre 
theology of the time, and encouraged us to preach and to 
pray, as if there were a soul as well as understanding in 
man, a spirit as well as a letter in revelation, and God 
were with us now in the church as well as of old with his 
chosen prophets in his law. I was sorry not to go to 
Basle, to the grave of De Wette, for he was friend as 
well as teacher, and we had corresponded together. He 
was a gentle and brave spirit, and had suffered much for 
conscience sake. He lives now in his works, and his 
translation of the Bible is likely to be a lasting monu- 
ment of his learning and truthfulness. 

Then as the range of care and enterprise increased, 
there came more ambitious studies for public uses, and the 
preacher who had a large parish in a university town was 
moved to do what he could to instruct the young people 
in the personages and principles of church history with 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 351 

proper consultation of original sources. What a world 
was opened in the old fathers and the modern reformers ! 
Of the old fathers, Augustine made the most mark upon 
me, and his naming sense of the work of God's grace 
upon man, his sagacious recognition of the continuity of 
history and the essential unity of the race, his generous 
interpretation of nature in connection with the scriptures, 
and his broad vision of the new city of God that was 
changing the face of the world, and building the new 
Jerusalem upon the broad foundation of the Roman 
empire, all these made the saintly Bishop of Hippo a 
light and power with the novice at his books ; and still 
the spell remains in these latter years, when I see from 
my window, here under the trees, the spire of the church 
that bears his name, and I sometimes give a lecture upon 
his life and his work. With such ancient studies, the 
new scholars and thinkers were heard, and to none of 
these do I owe more gratitude than to Frederick Maurice, 
especially to his " Kingdom of Christ " and his " Religions 
of the World," with their profound insight into the insti- 
tutions and ideas of the historical church, and the adapta- 
tion of its truth and grace to all the needs of man. At 
the same time the arts of industry and education were not 
neglected, and the student, fond as he was of Keble and 
Williams, and of the restorers of ancient devotion, was no 
stranger to the workshops, and the schools and the univer- 
sity, little claim as he may have had to a leading place there. 



352 MILE STONES IK OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

In this great city of New York the scene afterwards 
changed, and men and affairs threatened to crowd out 
study, but the work went on, and if the stirring town was 
too aggressive, the quiet country was more soothing, and 
books and the pen had new charm when you could play 
the peripatetic, and stretch your legs at will at intervals 
of weariness with reading and writing. Acquaintance 
was still kept up with the current thought of Europe and 
America, and time was found for a great subject such 
as Dante, who began modern thought, or Schleiermacher, 
who has tried to keep it within Christ's grace, for Goethe, 
who saw the universe in its beauty, or Hartmann, who 
unveils its pain and death ; and weeks and months were 
pressed for time and thought to study and write upon them 
with an approach to fidelity. Historical studies of home 
subjects came in for their share with lectures and addresses 
upon events and personages of New England and of New 
York. Learned and accomplished scholars were at hand 
to help all generous studies, and no man who has lived and 
worked with any earnestness in our city for the last twenty- 
five years, can fail to be grateful for the kind fellowship of 
society and liberal gift of information through word and 
books. Scholarship has been to me comprehensive, cath- 
olic indeed, in New York ; and Liberal and Evangelical, 
Congregationalist, Presbyterian, Methodist, Episcopalian, 
and Roman Catholic, Jews and Christians, have been 
friends and brothers in this companionship of letters. It 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 353 

is a good thing to have regular and organized help in 
study, and I recall with never lessening satisfaction the 
results of such help in two conspicuous instances. Happy- 
were the ten years or more that ended somewhere about 
1850, when a score of New England clergymen who were 
not willing to abandon the gospel and church for the new 
light of rationalism, combined together in the Union Pas- 
toral Association, and met once a month for conversation, 
deliberation, and worship. The men and their gifts were 
various, but the spirit was one. Edward B. Hall and 
Ephraim and Andrew P. Peabody, Frederick D. Hun- 
tington and J. I. T. Coolidge, Frederick H. Hedge, and 
George Putnam, S. K. Lothrop, T. B. Fox, and James 
W. Thompson were of the number, and their names in- 
dicate the comprehensiveness and the temper of the asso- 
ciation. It was a great loss to have this companionship 
broken by death and distances, and great is the satisfac- 
tion in the virtual renewal of its privileges after twenty 
years, by new fellowship with a company of scholars who 
are humane, thoughtful, and progressive as were the old 
set, and with little difference except in more positive and 
historical church institutions and convictions. 

But why urge so earnestly especial associations, when 
life itself in pastoral circles is constant association, and a 
man has always enough to study around him, and he 
ought always to find motive enough to think seriously, 
and to work bravely. When the vicissitudes and charac- 
23 



354 MILE STONES LN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

ters of parish life are taken out of the sphere of private 
gossip and personal caprice, and lifted into the sphere of 
Christian faith and church communion, great is the trans- 
formation ; and they help on its better spirit alike by 
their sacrifice and their cheer. It is well to do what we 
can to bring about this result by elevating sociality into 
religious purposes, instead of letting religion down into 
personal frivolity. If church clothes and ways may be too 
stiff and stately, parlor clothes and ways may be too easy 
in some respects, and too costly and conventional also ; 
and it is a grave question whether anything is gained by 
the new familiarity in religious affairs, which regards a 
picnic as the Pentecost, puts a tea-table in place of the 
Eucharist, and is eager to bring dances and plays as near 
as possible if not into the sanctuary. Much is done by en- 
couraging the people to bring the education of their chil- 
dren within positive church influences under their pastor. 
The Sunday school should be the children's church, and 
with hymn and prayer, thoughtful instruction should be 
mingled, and they should be led to take part in public 
worship, and to feel the cheer and the power of the asso- 
ciations and influences that go with a wise church order, 
and open to the child's soul the heavenly graces that were 
owned in Baptism, and that introduced him to his place 
in the Kingdom of God. The evening Sunday service 
is full of opportunity for such instruction and influence, 
and no seasons of my pastoral life are more precious in 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 355 

remembrance than the years which redeemed the Sunday 
evening from empty seats and indifference, and cheered 
the gathered people with sweet music, and Scripture les- 
sons and psalms, called them to join in responses, and 
encouraged the preacher to bring out things, new and old, 
from his studies, and to combine to the best of his ability 
the stores of culture, whether from history, literature, art 
or science with the truths of religion. 

I cannot leave without mention one author to whose 
thoughts I have probably given more study the last twenty 
years or more, than to any other man's, and whom I can 
name more fitly now as he treats so much of matters 
greatly agitated in our time, especially the relation of re- 
ligion to the church and the nation. I remember bring- 
ing Richard Rothe's three solid volumes of " Theological 
Ethics " into the country long years ago, and beginning 
the introductory essay of some two hundred pages with 
amazement, that a man of known sense could possibly be 
so obscure and dull. But he held me closely to him for 
some weeks, and I have read him more or less ever since. 
His book is regarded by many of the best scholars as the 
most thorough and valuable work ever written upon the 
subject, and as the most important contribution to theol- 
ogy in our time. He is apparently more prized in Ger- 
many than any other recent author who has positively 
Christian convictions, and everything that he left on 
paper when he died, in 1868, has been published, and 



356 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

even his fragmentary notes have been edited. I have 
here on my table the last of these publications, the first 
volume of his devotional evening instructions to theolog- 
ical students (1834-37), a book full of tenderness and 
wisdom. I have written out my studies of his mind in 
full elsewhere, and I will only say now how precious he 
has been as an interpreter of the source of virtue as well 
as duty in God and Christ, and with what insight and 
breadth he brings the whole range of life within the power 
of Christian faith and love, and especially how strongly 
he insists upon the state or the nation as divinely or- 
dained, and as the coming sphere of Godly manhood. 
Germany in one respect has taken him at his word, and 
he who in his lifetime was regarded as a dreamer in his 
idea of having the church consummated, and perhaps ab- 
sorbed in the nation, is now found to be the prophet of 
the present German empire, with its state church, and 
perhaps its state that may claim too imperiously to be the 
sufficient church. The recent development of affairs in 
Christendom has not led me to accept this view of the 
church and the nation, and surely in our America nothing 
could be worse for us, than undertaking to make over the 
church to the national government, or even to slight the 
institutions of the church and the clergy with the inten- 
tion of putting the mind and conscience of the people 
wholly into politics. We need reform sadly, every think- 
ing man knows, but our experience in leaving even so 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 357 

much of education within the control of politicians, warns 
us to beware of taking religion away from its spiritual 
foundations and functions, and making it over in any 
way to secular powers. The more independent and posi- 
tive our American Church is, the better her influence over 
the nation, the stronger her moral power in civil reform. 
England is seeing this evidently, and her church is striving 
to win the people by spiritual methods, in view of the 
dangers that threaten her civic relations ; and as matters 
are now, the Church of England more and more seeks 
jurisdiction within her own authorities, and less and less 
depends upon court power. Her gain of strength the last 
forty years has been from her own spiritual life. It is 
tribute enough to Rothe's rendering of civic virtue to 
affirm with him the insufficiency of merely ceremonial 
service, and the danger of merely sacerdotal sway over 
religion. Patriot as he was, and loyal son of a father who 
served Frederick the Great, he loved his nation with a 
Christian heart, and he had a more living sense of Christ 
as the present Saviour, than any of the theological leaders 
of his time. We need his ethics of patriotism here in Amer- 
ica, and we can have this without accepting his theory of 
the consummation of the state in the dissolution of the 
historical church, or of the making over of its functions 
to an ecclesiastical commission, or a committee of devotion. 
The heavenly powers, of course, enter into all fidelity, and 
inspire all virtue and sacrifice ; but they have their own 



358 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

scriptures and ministry and shrines, and those who have 
watched the course of affairs in America, and tried to 
find and to give divine peace and motive, must confess 
that the church has its own hallowed sphere, and that 
there in a peculiar sense the tabernacle of God is with 
men. To me the historical church has been the best 
teacher, and in her various forms, from the Puritan pas- 
tor of my childhood to the studies and companionships of 
these sober years, the church has been teacher and com- 
forter, with a liberty ever enlarging, and thought and 
purpose ever more inspiriting. Rothe had the supersti- 
tions of Rome so constantly before his eyes after his long 
residence there, that he saw no security against Romish 
bondage except in the state. Many men who have seen 
the Pope, and lived in Rome, are still glad to keep the 
two great words together, Christ and the Church. 

VI.— THE OUTLOOK. 

Those of us, who have reached threescore years have 
no great cause to be anxious as to what is to happen to us 
personally in this world, as our career is so far run, and 
the end is near. But for our children and grandchildren, 
for our country and our race, there are many perplexing 
questions which it is hard to settle, and which now cloud 
the prospect. These late years, that now pass in review, 
have been full of changes and disappointments to commu- 
nities and families, and although a man who has lived all 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 359 

the while on the same hill-side in summer and in the same 
street in winter, and loved the same books and held es- 
sentially the same faith, and followed the same habits of 
pen and voice, has no reason to complain of a broken life ; 
yet there have been great breaks in the life of us all who 
have learned that we are in the same boat with our neigh- 
bors, our nation, and our race. In fact the map of the 
world within that time has been changed, and the actual 
and prospective lines of civil and religious domination 
have been vastly altered. In our own country there is 
hardly a man in power who was heard of twenty years 
ago, and the men who are now up for the highest offices, 
with a single exception, were not conspicuous enough to 
be named then in the very generous cyclopaedias and dic- 
tionaries of the time. 

The local communities that I have personally known 
have signally changed. My native town, Charlestown, 
has become a part of Boston, and after preaching in St. 
John's Church there on the eve of the annexations in 
1874, I heard the chimes of old Christ Church bells, that 
seemed to celebrate the union, and to recall the days when 
to me, a child, those bells were the only voice to speak of 
the mother church of our Puritan race. The village of 
Nashua is now a thriving city, centre of lines of railroad, 
and with a funded debt noted upon the price current hon- 
orably. The city of Providence has gone from 25,000 in- 
habitants to near 100,000, and with great loss of citizens 



360 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

by death, and of property by misfortune, her career is 
prosperous ; and if we judge by the permanence of her 
present mayor in office, who was one of our Bible-class, 
and Sunday-school boys, her policy is settled and her basis 
sure. New York has nearly doubled her population and 
vastly magnified her territory, and in spite of the knavery 
that has robbed her, and of the dangers that threaten her 
trade and her order, the city was never so fair to the eye, 
and so hopeful in the essentials of prosperity, however 
checked in her imperial pride. There the tide of busi- 
ness rolls on, and although the particles constantly pass 
away, the stream flows on very much the same, and is 
likely to flow for ages. 

It has been not easy for industrious and intelligent men 
always to earn a fair living in the great city, and wary 
thinkers and observers say that our children are to have a 
harder time than we have had. But sunshine as well as 
cloud has its surprises, and light breaks upon the dark- 
ness when night is deepest. If one asks anxiously what 
evil is coming, a brighter spirit may ask what good is 
near ? It is vain to try, however, to hide the fact, that the 
present time is not especially fruitful in optimists, that 
there is a tone of sadness in the most vital literature and 
art of our time, that the cultivated classes are not partic- 
ularly merry now, and that many careful thinkers see 
breakers ahead. Mr. W. R. Greg may not be one of the 
wisest of men, but he is surely one of the keenest observ- 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 361 

ers, and the most candid of writers; and he treats not 
only of England, but of Europe and America, when he 
sees " Rocks Ahead " in the political supremacy of the 
lower classes, the decline of industry and the divorce of 
intelligence from religion. Professor Huxley is not es- 
pecially cheering in what he lately said at Baltimore of 
our prospective two hundred millions of people in 1976, 
under the despotism of universal suffrage, and from Pro- 
fessor von Laveleye of Liittich, who is a corresponding 
member of the Institute of France, we have a tract 
dated Nordlingen, 1876, which points out the pressing 
danger to civilized nations from three prominent assaults 
upon the religious idea which is so essential to morality 
and even to civilization, — the tendency of natural science 
to rest in materialism and to deny God and immortality ; 
the incessant pursuit of wealth with the attendant habits 
of luxury ; and thirdly the new socialism, which accepts 
the rising philosophy of material force, denies all spir- 
itual realities, and threatens to set up its own rule of 
might. So calm and candid and profound a thinker as 
the younger Fichte, so called not from his youth, for he 
was born in 1797, but from contrast with his father, the 
great philosopher of that name, wrote in the last work of 
•his that we have seen, the Letters to Dr. E. Zeller on the 
latest movement of German speculation, with the preface 
dated Spring, 1876, shortly before he died: "It is not so 
much the unbelief which is in the first instance to be com- 



362 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

plained of. This is only the symptom and working of a 
deeper evil ; of the increasing decay of all ideal disposi- 
tions, of occupation and satisfaction with the sensuous, 
phenomenal, and perishable. In practical relations, this 
appears in a soul-corroding luxury, which, according to 
necessary laws, ends in Pessimism; in art an empirical 
realism which selfishly feels only after consequences ; in 
science, in great discoveries and actual achievements of 
exact investigation, besides a collection of empirical ma- 
terial in fragmentary individual researches, and in dislike 
of all guiding speculative ideas, an overestimate of the 
value of such unconnected, peculiarly fruitless results, in 
short an empiricism without ideas, whose last result can 
be only a theoretical materialism, which followed conse- 
quently threatens to end naturally in moral nihilism. If 
this is unquestionably the characteristic of the present 
temper of the world and the age, then the future, left to 
itself, must expect only more advanced developments of 
it. And thus it is to be feared, that we are gradually ap- 
proaching an abyss, which hides within itself conditions, 
which historically the Roman empire presented under the 
rule of the Caesars. There, as now, great intellectual 
culture and many sided susceptibility towards the aesthetic 
beautified enjoyments of life were combined with fright- 
ful self-seeking and reckless cruelty. Over all swept a 
deep feeling of the worthlessness of all earthly existence, 
which looked to death by suicide as the ready resort, when 
pleasure is exhausted, and sorrow or want invade-." 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 363 

This is a somewhat dark picture of our time, but there 
is much truth in its drawing and coloring, and the pros- 
pect before us is surely not all sunshine and roses. It is 
evident that ideal principles are at a discount now, and the 
age moves by the facts of nature and the science which 
these facts teach, and by the forces which this science can 
bring into the field. We are not to quarrel with this 
disposition, but rather try to carry it up into the higher 
sphere, and to acknowledge all the facts, to rise from them 
into the higher science of God and the soul, and to win the 
force that this high science bestows. We are disposed to 
quarrel with our age for not being practical and energetic 
enough. Our young people seem to me to be too nervous 
and fidgety, in danger of being distracted by over-excite- 
ment ; they are too self-indulgent and exacting, with desires 
far in excess of their achievement; they are unsettled, 
and in peril of losing the loyal convictions that are the 
ground of all peace and power, whether in private or 
in public life. 

As to the present shaking of the old faith and rise of 
materialism, it is not well to be timid, much less despairing. 
The new science undoubtedly makes many infidels and 
destroys many old traditions ; but it is not necessarily 
atheistic or materialistic. If the theory of Evolution is 
so explained as to lose God in material atoms and agen- 
cies, it is perverted from its jnst bearings ; and the Chris- 
tian man who traces the work of God in the ages of 



364 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

Creation, and in the aeons of progress, may rejoice in the 
Incarnation and the Church as the crown of creation, and 
the complete manifestation of God. It cannot be denied, 
however, that there are two systems of nature that now 
are held in high quarters, that are disheartening and de- 
moralizing. We may illustrate them by the atheism of 
Haeckel, and the Pantheism of Schopenhauer and Von 
Hartmann. Few serious thinkers will agree with the 
monstrous atheism of Haeckel, who ascribes all move- 
ment and organism, all thought, feeling and will, all life 
and personality, to atoms and mechanical forces. The pres- 
ent tendency among intellectual adventurers and specula- 
tive free thinkers, lies the other way, and the pantheistic 
movement that Spinoza headed two centuries ago, has 
borne fruits very different from what he seems to have 
anticipated in the pantheistic Pessimism of the present 
day which ascribes all conscious life to an unconscious 
and almighty power, and finds no personal Providence, no 
mercy before the throne of Sovereign Law. It may be 
as the younger Fichte before his death, recently wrote, 
that this school of thought has culminated, and is now de- 
clining, yet its power is still great, and it is making con- 
verts still. 

These new fatalists profess indeed a code of mercy, 
and claim to be examples of genuine and self-sacrificing 
humanity, in virtually accepting the creed of Buddha, 
which declares that a sense of the inherent wretchedness 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 365 

life, and of the blessedness of being out of it, should lead 
men to pity and to help each other in the sympathy of 
common misery. So it is that Pessimism preaches its doc- 
trine of the Cross, and does not disdain to consecrate the 
great sorrow of mankind by beautiful art, whilst it offers 
not redemption from sin and death, but the redemption 
which is death forever. It is said that Richard Wagner 
holds the pessimist philosophy, and that he believes in 
music as the prelude of the Nirvana, where pain and per- 
sonality are lost in the unconscious all. If so the Pas- 
sion Trilogy of Bayreuth, which emperors and princes 
lately thronged to hear, resembles in a measure the Pas- 
sion Play of Ober-Ammergau in the near mountains, with 
the difference that the Passion Trilogy holds out in its 
music of the future nothing of the Redeemer whom those 
mountain peasants set forth upon the cross. But names 
and theories must not blind us to the excellences of men, 
and to the movements of humanity. Wagner's music may 
be prophetic of a pathos of sacrifice and faith deeper than 
his theory, and it may exalt the worship of the church 
of the future more than he believes. Such notions cannot 
satisfy the soul nor meet the facts of history, or the wants 
of society. These system makers may say, for example, 
that love between man and woman is the one sin, whether 
without law or with law, and that to live and to have 
children is treason against mankind, and that the world 
is now on its last legs, and had better be left to die. The 



366 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE- JOURNEY. 

world is old and shaky and childhood died with Greece, 
they say. They do not believe it when they come to the 
real test. Hartmann has lately married, and he writes of 
his charming wife and of his playful child, from his Ber- 
lin home in the midst of the gardens. That child is 
young as childhood ever was in Greece, and our boys and 
girls are as merry as the little ones who bowed down for 
father Abraham's blessing, or they who laughed and wept 
by turns when they heard old Homer's song. Life is and 
will be in spite of what we say, or write, or dream, and 
this two yearling girl who is running about the room, or 
gamboling among the flowers and chickens, and who the 
other evening cried out at the moon, and began to climb 
up the piazza pillar to get to it for a plaything, has a 
dominant force of blood and nerve and brain and soul, 
that will keep the world going better than the dry philos- 
ophers whom such as she make no scruple of pulling by 
the nose in her glee and her dash. 

Life is a great fact and a great force, and so is God. 
Reason of him as we may, or deny or limit his being and 
attributes, and he is the same — not only within nature, 
but above it, not only immanent, as the new thinkers are 
so fond of saying, but transcendent, or above nature, even 
He whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain. With- 
out Him the future is a blank, as the past is an enigma 
and the present a desert. 

It may be true as Uhlhorn, Fichte and various other 



AFTER THOUGHTS. 367 

writers have hinted, that the present age in many respects 
resembles the Rome of the Caesars, but it does not follow 
that all is dark in our future on that account. The empire 
of the Caesars was the external condition of the rise and 
progress of the universal Kingdom of Christ, and as a 
recent author has truly said, the Christian era began vir- 
tually with the accession of Augustus, nearly thirty years 
before our Lord's birth. If the luxury and superstition 
of the empire called for the Redeemer's coming, the Roman 
language, roads, and law, prepared the way of its triumph. 
Now that the twentieth century, since Octavius became 
Augustus Caesar, has begun, and we find a new, more uni- 
versal empire of civilization opening upon us with dan- 
gers so alarming, we may as well look for the favorable 
conditions of this civilization, and see in its new science 
and arts, its new forces and combinations, helps for the 
coming Kingdom of God. When has there been such a 
preparation for the rule of piety and humanity, for the 
opening of nature to man, and of man to God. To say 
nothing of the fact that the speech of the Anglo- German 
race is mastering the literature and business of the world, 
consider the startling fact that the nations of the globe 
have but one arithmetic, which is the language of trade, 
they sing and march by pretty much the same music, 
which is the language of feeling, and they carry the bur- 
dens of industry by the same engines, and send the tid- 
ings of correspondence by the same flashing wire. "Who 



368 MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY. 

shall be the Augustus Caesar of this new Universal King- 
dom, and who shall be the high priest of this new fellow- 
ship of nations and men ? 

Our reply is prompt, sufficient, and decisive. The God 
of our fathers will be with us as with them. Let us favor 
all science, whether physical or social, all art, alike the 
industrial and the beautiful, all association, whether 
domestic, neighborly, national or cosmopolitan. Let us 
preach the principles of peace, and set forth its code of 
reconciliation between nations. But how can there be 
any unity, any faith, any progress, any blessing without 
the living God, who is above all, in all, and moving all to 
the Supreme Good? 

The most familiar of truths is the grandest of powers, 
and the spring of all the best hope and progress. It was 
spoken at our Baptism, in guardian promise, and deepens 
in tenderness at every Communion ; it is sung in the 
Gloria in Excelsis, with the pathos of its sufferer, and 
the jubilee of its victor ; it runs through the Te Deum, 
which is the anthem of civilization as well as the hymn 
of worship, and no words that are heard among men 
mean more to our time than the clause, Likewise the 
Holy Ghost the Comforter. That Friend be with us when 
we meet and when we part. 

Waldstein, Fairfield, Conn., September 16, 1876. 



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